: Local officials, desperate to meet impossible state targets, inflated production figures. This led the central government to over-procure grain, leaving the rural population with nothing to eat. Impact and Legacy
: The famine was exacerbated by the diverted labor of millions from farming to industrial projects like "backyard steel furnaces," which produced useless metal while crops rotted in fields. Mao's Great Famine
: A public health initiative that targeted sparrows, among other "pests". The mass killing of sparrows caused a locust population explosion that decimated grain crops. : Local officials, desperate to meet impossible state