On Anhui Population Change During The Three Years Of Natural Disasters

During the three years (1959~1961), the natural disasters, the"Great Leap Forward"and some other facts made China to be in great famine. There appeared many people dead unnaturally and the development of national economy was in severe trouble. The three years was called China's 3-year economic difficulties. During the three years, as different natural conditions, different social and economic conditions , there were great differences between the phenomenon of unnaturally death in different regions. Those populous provinces, such as Sichuan, Henan, Shandong, Anhui, Hebei, were more serious. Anhui had its own features.This paper tries to reflect the process of population change of Anhui through these aspects: the change of fertility, birth and death rates, migration, population structure and so on. We can find these features of Anhui population: fertility and birth rates were the lowest level, while the mortality rate was the highest level in the whole country, and large numbers of people flew out, so the population loss was enormous. This paper thinks there were two reasons which caused the great famine: population policy and population pressure. We should learn something from it.