For the duration of Mao’s first 5 year plan and the Great Leap Forward (GLF) the economy of China was transformed in many aspects.  His attempts of vast industrial and agricultural reform impacted greatly on the economy, however this cannot be interpreted as wholly successful in modernizing Chinas economy.

Mao's first 5 year plan recognised the need to reform heavy industry through a focus on steel, iron, coal and chemical production acceleration. China's relation with Stalin's communist Russia allowed for Mao's plan to become a reality. China and Russia signed a "Treaty of friendship" allowing for China to receive money and technical assistance in the form of 10,000 engineers in order to promote industrial modernisation. This great step in industrial production saw an output of 124 million tonnes of coal and 5.2 million tonnes of steel in 1957, doubling that of 1952. This treaty of friendship accelerated production in heavy industry and so contributed greatly to modernising China and thus its economy. However, this great economic success could be argued as a failure for modernising the economy as it set a precedent for equal (if not higher) outputs in Mao's following 5 year plan, that soon became an unrealistic goal. Furthermore, although the treaty allowed for a great acceleration in industrial production, it left China in vast amounts of debt to Russia. This resulted in the majority of industrial and agricultural produce being returned to Russia in order to repay debt, reducing the ultimate output to not as great amount more than the previous years of production and nulling its success of modernisation. This repayment of agricultural production can also be partially blamed for the Great Famine in the following GLF.

Although the industrial success of the first 5 year plan did result beneficially for the economy, it resulted in a neglect for agricultural reform. The majority of money and time was invested in industry, with little focus or effort on agriculture. Agricultural outputs were bypassed by industrial without concern and so the first 5 year plan showed little development and modernisation of agriculture and therefore did little to modernise the economy. This meant that the vast success of heavy industry in China was outweighed by the neglect of agriculture.

During the GLF Mao identified steel and grain production as key to economic development. Mao’s ambitions were high, and he aimed for steel production to surpass that of the UK’s. This meant that Mao introduced backyard furnaces, where farmers would produce steel in home-built furnaces. After introduction of near 600,000 backyard furnaces, a further 11,000,000 tonnes of steel was being contributed to China’s industry. Although this promoted steel production greatly, the steel produced was of poor quality and of little use. Farmers weren't trained or skilled enough to reach such high targets. This failed effort also meant that farmers were being diverted from agricultural development for little and so prevented the economy from developing and modernizing as well as diverting attention from more vital issues in agriculture that would later contribute to the Great Famine.

In order to promote grain production Mao introduced the “4 Noes campaign” in 1958. The campaign identified sparrows, flies, mosquitoes and rats the pests responsible for stunting grain production. The public were urged to bang drums and chase the sparrows to prevent them from landing until they would die of exhaustion. Mao believed that by eliminating these 4 pests it would boost grain production and thus contribute greatly to modernizing and building the economy. Although in theory Mao’s policy could contribute to grain production, the near extinction of each of the animals caused a severe ecological imbalance which can credited with exacerbating the Great Famine. In addition, the campaign was another diversion for working men and women from agricultural and industrial work that would have been more effective to contributing to the economy, especially since the campaign offered non-material rewards, and so this prevented from modernising the economy.

In the GLF Mao strived to collectively use power of the peasantry in order to develop a high functioning and modern economy. He did this through the creation of communes. Communes could consist of up to 30,000 people living in barracks with communal kitchens and segregated living quarters. Cadres would operate these communes, encouraging and rewarding hard work. By segregating people in these communes and removing all possessions Mao believed it would encourage the peasants to achieve higher production rates in order to build and ultimately modernise the economy. Although this plan was theoretically logical for pooling the skills of the peasants, many were not skilled or prepared enough to reach the targets they were set. Like the backyard furnaces, the collective focus on production was a significant factor that lead to the Great Famine, and therefore radically failed at modernising the economy.