While food production rose substantially after 1949, population increases were nearly as great until the 1980s.[1] Production of grain, the source of about 75 percent of the calories in the Chinese diet, grew at an average rate of 2.7 percent a year between 1952 and 1979, while population growth averaged almost 2 percent a year.[1] Total grain output per capita grew from 288 kilograms a year in 1952 to 319 kilograms in 1978, an increase of only 11 percent in 26 years.[1] As of 1986, grain output was 369 kilograms per capita.[1]