Feifei Zhang, Guoxia Wang and Jianming Cai

In: UA Magazine 17 - Strengthening Urban Producers' Organisations

In 1978, China started to dismantle the commune system and the socalled "eating from the same big pot" that existed for decades, i.e. absolute egalitarianism whereby everyone gets the same benefits irrespective of his/her performance. Village land began to be contracted to peasant families on a 30-year basis in most cases and a system of "household contract responsibility" was introduced that set farm output quotas for each household and linked remuneration to output.