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The Chinese do not see wine as one of the necessities of life, but in their social life the culture of wine as a distinct cultural form has made and continues to make an impact on the way the Chinese live. Chinese alcoholic drinks are chiefly made from grain. Throughout the long history of China, with its large population and long-term reliance on agriculture, the ups and downs of the wine trade have been closely bound up with political, economic and social conditions. The fluctuations in the grain harvest were like a barometer for the ups and downs of the wine business. The successive ruling dynasties issued or relaxed restrictions on wine production according to the grain harvests to make sure that people had enough to live on.