The relationship between the economic situation of the Peoples' Republic of China (PRC) and the international grain market can be summarized succinctly. Over the past two decades, the average annual growth rates of food grains production and population in China have not differed greatly, and the per capita food grains supply in 1977 cannot have been much greater than it was in 1957. At current population growth rates, which perhaps have fallen as low as 1.7% per year (Aird), failure to sustain a positive food-grains growth rate would result in either declining per capita consumption or an average annual increase in food grains imports of 4-5 million tons. The former would be politically unacceptable and the latter eventually would be economically crippling, because there is no indication that China can generate enough foreign exchange to pay for both substantially increasing grain imports and the modern technology which it currently demands. It is therefore imperative for PRC to continue to pursue policies intended to maintain at least approximate self-sufficiency.1 This considerably understates Chinese intentions, however. In recent months, the Chinese government has enunciated unusually high targets for agricultural growth and defined the policies and technological improvements required to attain them. Food grains (including soybeans) output, currently at a level of more than 280 million tons per year, is supposed to reach 400 million tons by 1985, requiring average annual growth of 4.5%. Other components of agricultural production are expected to grow at similar rates. China's population control program has been given further priority, and a concrete target set for 1980 of reduction to a 1% annual growth rate (Foreign Broadcast Information Service: PRC, hereafter cited as FBIS, 11 July 1978: E20). If China's achievements fell well short of these goals the PRC could be expected to play a moderately significant role in world grain trade only sporadically, in years when poor harvests forced a drawdown of stocks. However, should China even approach its plan targets, it conceivably could become an exporter of wheat and corn as well as rice, and/or of meat and other subsidiary food products in greater quantity. Consequently, I wil examine both the past performance and the new program which will determine the pr spects for higher future growth.