MODERNISING CHINESE AGRICULTURE
[AGRICULTURE.] BEIJING MUNICIPAL BUREAU FOR AGRICULTURAL MACHINERY.
农业机械安全生产挂图 [Nongye jixie anquan shengchan guatu; ‘Posters showing safe Production with agricultural Machinery’].
[Beijing], China Agriculture Press for Xinhua Bookshop, [late 1970s].
Six posters (each c. 763 x 524 mm); each with 5–13 colour illustrations reproduced from paintings, text in simplified Chinese characters; folds and a few other minor creases, light browning to versos; else in excellent condition.
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农业机械安全生产挂图 [Nongye jixie anquan shengchan guatu; ‘Posters showing safe Production with agricultural Machinery’].
Very rare complete set of posters promoting the modernisation of agriculture at the outset of China’s economic reform.
The six posters here attest to the nascent wave of industrialisation after the end of the Cultural Revolution as well as to concerns about the safe use of new technology. Slogans include ‘The fundamental path forward for agriculture lies in mechanisation’, ‘Ensure traffic safety in town and country – serve the agricultural sector better’, ‘Operate machinery correctly – prevent mechanical and electrical accidents’, and ‘Everyone is responsible for safe production’. Through more than fifty illustrations and captions the posters exhort one to keep machine parts well-oiled, to use adequate lighting when working at night, not to jump from moving vehicles, not to modify vehicles to increase their speed, not to encroach on bicycle lanes, and not to hitch oneself to automobiles when cycling, inter alia.
The present set is in excellent condition, particularly for ephemera intended to be posted on walls for instruction.
We have traced only one other set of these posters, in the Landsberger Collection at the International Institute of Social History.
