A Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry (_Nung Lin Pu_) was set up in 1940 as the third economic ministry. Industrialization's dependence on farm products makes this an invaluable coordinate to the other two Ministries. The Chinese are in many cases proceeding directly from pre-industrial to the latest chemico-industrial techniques, and skipping the phase of reliance upon subsoil minerals. Gasoline is being mixed with fuel alcohol derived from grain; plastics are appearing. Agriculture also involved China's greatest social problem--that of encouraging freehold or cooperative farming at the expense of sharecropping. Much of the agricultural reform is undertaken by the new local government and provincial government plans, but the problems of farm prices, general farm planning, and utilization of agricultural products fall on the Ministry. It is headed, not by a farm leader or expert, but by the General Chên Chi-tang, former governor of Kwangtung Province.[20] [Footnote 20: China Information Committee, _News Release_, Chungking, July 1, 1940.] A proposed Material and Resources Control and Supervision Ministry (or Ministry of Economic Warfare), based approximately upon the British Ministry of Supplies, is in process of organization.[21] The Ministry may be kept independent of either the Executive _Yüan_ or Military Affairs Commission, since it is to coordinate a group of industrial and commercial agencies which are now independent. Upon its establishment, the Ministry of Economic Affairs will become one of Industry and Commerce, and a central agency for economic war work will be available. [Footnote 21: The same, December 23, 1940.] The National Relief Commission (_Chên-chi Wei-yüan-hui_) supervises the general relief work of the government, which is performed in part by the extragovernmental war and Party agencies and in part by local and provincial authorities. The immensity of the relief problem in China has always been such that organized relief can do no more than stir the misery of the masses. Opportunely for the National Government, the Imperial Japanese Army is securely in possession of the world's greatest relief problem, and unable to relinquish it. Chungking is more fortunate. (The author never dreamed that prosperity such as he saw in West China could exist in Asia. Prices are extremely high, but wages and farm prices tend to follow, and unemployment--always low in China because of the work-sharing role of the family--is almost completely out of sight. Skilled labor commands remuneration fantastic by pre-existing scales.)