Thirty years ago, when rationing coupons were required for almost all daily necessities, most Chinese people didn't have much sense about fashion clothing color options were mainly refined to blue, gray and brown.

China's rise to an economic power has been a bumpy ride strewn with ups and downs. But questions arise over whether a simple, but hurtful, comment by a Western journalist about Chinese clothing has been the initial catalyst for massive changes, writes Cheng Yunjie. Eventful journey from drab paupers to sharp powerhouse dressers Cheng Yunjie.

Young Chinese feel it natural to be particular about their clothing style these days? after all, one is what one wears.

And when basketball vests and low-cut dresses are in vogue, young people start looking for fabrics that offer shape retention, comfort, moisture management or are quick drying.

But 30 years ago, when rationing coupons were needed for almost all daily necessities, it was not a question of "chic or not" bothering most Chinese parents. Instead they were worried about how to get their hands on enough cloth to dress the whole family in a decent fashion.

With clothing color options mainly confined to blue, gray and brown --a result of the then lagging textile industry --French journalist Robert Guillain jokingly described the Chinese as the "blue ants under the red flag."

This seemingly incredible Western view caused much pain for Chinese leaders by the early 1970s, reveals Chen Jinhua, a retired senior official, in his newly published memoirs "The Eventful Years."

To a great extent, it triggered a U-turn in government policies, prompting the Chinese Communist Party to engage with developed Western countries in the fields of diplomacy and economy.

Just 22 years after China's foundation in 1949, the country providing for 21 percent of the world's population but with just seven percent of the globe's arable land had been caught in a battle between cotton and grain.

With cotton being the dominant raw material for the textile industry, expanding cotton production gave rise to the shrinkage of land for grain growing. This risked putting more people in danger of starvation in scenes reminiscent of the disaster of the "Great Leap Forward" during the 1950s.

In September 1971, when Chairman Mao Zedong went on an inspection tour to Changsha, capital of Hunan Province, he granted his staff a day off to investigate what things were like.

One woman worker returned very excited. "When Mao asked what had come over her, she replied: 'I bought a pair of terylene trousers after standing in a queue for ages'," says Chen, who was deputy director of the Planning Group of the Ministry of Light Industry at the time.

Unlike average cotton pants, terylene trousers had smartly pressed straight creases and did not wrinkle. Mao was surprised by the woman's answer and told Premier Zhou Enlai that "standing in a queue for a little while might be okay, but never 'for ages'."

"Can't we buy the technology?" was the question Mao threw at Zhou. The answer was "of course."

This dialogue, Chen recalls, was the beginning of China's preparations for the second round of importing complete sets of technology and equipment, mostly for chemical fiber and fertilizer production, from developed Western countries such as the United States, Japan, Germany, the United Kingdom, France, Italy and Canada.

Faced with a grave economic crisis in the early 1970s, Western countries hoped to find a solution for their surplus productivity and were eager to do business with China.