During the early industrial revolution people were not starving in the countryside because of poor harvests. They were starving in the countryside because the UK at that time siezed land that was previously held in common and granted it to the nobility through the enclosure acts. Now to survive as a peasant you could not subsist off of common land, you had to pay rent to a lord and work their land, and as agricultural productivity increased through mechanization and improved farming techniques the lords only needed so many people to work. A subsistence farmer would become unable to afford rising rents, as they did not benefit from mechanization due to not having the capital to buy machines.

Yes agreed, but the net result is that living in the countryside was far from romanticized agrarian life people often picture it as. Lords owning land was a very old idea, it's a bit of a leap to say that was due to mechanization.