1627 Rise of the South China Sea

Chapter 322
Although a trial ride was arranged, the "intercity rail transit plan" carefully designed by the Ministry of Construction did not win the favor of investors. Except for Li Nai, other investors did not show obvious investment interest in this project .The North Vietnamese mission quietly inquired whether this artifact could be introduced to Annan, but after hearing the quotation and construction period of the railway project, Zheng Zuo silently shut his mouth—rather than spending a few dollars to recruit thousands of migrant workers If it takes a year to build the railway from Thang Long Mansion to the front line, it would be more practical to train these migrant workers as musketeers and send them to the battlefield.

Compared with the land reclamation development projects with more intuitive effects, infrastructure projects such as the construction of the railway system are not very popular. The reason is that investors do not have enough confidence in the future development of the Sanya area and dare not easily invest in such projects. It is a project with a large initial investment, an uncertain market prospect, and a particularly long payback period.Schneider, who was in charge of attracting investment, didn't feel very frustrated about this. This kind of situation had been expected in advance.

The reason why this kind of infrastructure projects that investors are not very interested in is added to the list of "Qiong Lianfa" projects is mainly because these projects will involve various sensitive issues related to land during the implementation process. The "private enterprise" shell of "Qiong Lianfa" will be used as a cover to control some conflicts that will arise at that time to the level of civil conflicts, and will not rise to the height of "Haihan VS Daming".It doesn't matter whether these infrastructure projects are successful or not. After all, such projects are regarded by the executive committee as the foundation of the future development of Sanya, and they will not simply use profitability as the basis for their implementation, even if there is no foreign investor. Participation, the executive committee will still allocate special funds for implementation.

On the morning of April [-]th, the members of the "Qiong Lianfa" shareholder investigation group arrived at the Shengli Port Wharf with sleepy eyes. In the production situation of the Salt Industry Commune, if time permits, I will go to the Lianghe area to the west in the afternoon to inspect the future Sanya Inland River Port project.

In the executive committee's strategy of exporting industrial products to the mainland, table salt has always been one of the most important products. Salt production has been a key production item of the executive committee since the early days of crossing, even during the most tense period of human resources. , The Executive Committee also tried its best to ensure the manpower needs of the Salt Field Commune.In the opinion of the Executive Committee, although industrial products such as table salt are not as easy to reap huge profits as glass products and ammunition, the market as a daily necessities is far better than other commodities.With the help of advanced production and management technology, Haihan Salt has maintained extremely low production costs while continuously expanding its production capacity. This kind of competitive advantage is not possessed by the official counterparts of Daming.

The shareholders of "Qiong Lianfa" are rich businessmen with considerable strength in the coastal areas of South China. Some of them, such as Li Nai, Zhan Gui, etc., have long been cooperating with the Transit Group to traffic in private salt, but they have not yet come into contact with this business field. The others are the ones that the business department plans to focus on promoting this time.In fact, one of the development projects list of "Qiong Lianfa" is "Haihan Salt Industry Operation Plan". To expand, the cake will be made bigger by means of joint ventures of more than a dozen shareholders.The purpose of arranging this on-site inspection is to demonstrate the local salt production capacity to these shareholders and convince them that Victory Port can provide sufficient supply.

When the ship arrived at the Shengli Port Salt Field, it was catching up with the cargo ship "Fu Ruifeng" to load salt here.Anxi, the director of the salt industry of the Crossing Group, introduced the operating status of the Shengli Port Salt Field to the delegation: "The Shengli Port Salt Field Commune has more than 800 members, and the annual output of salt is more than 800 million catties, which is only the output of this place. , has exceeded the annual salt consumption of the entire Qiongzhou Island. At present, our monthly export of salt has reached 60 to [-] catties. The bosses should be very clear about the current salt price in Daming. If you are interested, you can Calculate for yourself how much money you can make after trafficking so much salt to the mainland."

Someone in the inspection team asked: "According to what Director An said, isn't it that the per capita output has reached [-] jin? As far as I know, there is no salt farm in Ming Dynasty that has such a capability. What evidence is there for such a large output? "

"It's not easy to see the evidence." Anxi raised his hand and pointed forward: "Over there is the salt warehouse of the Salt Field Commune. Let's go and have a look."

At present, the reconstruction and expansion project of the Shengli Port Salt Field has been basically completed. The construction of the production area and living area of ​​the entire salt field has come to an end. The last part of the project is the construction of several salt warehouses near the coast.For waterproof and moisture-proof considerations, the salt warehouses are all masonry structures, and the roofs are also made of locally-made cement prefabricated panels, and even used asphalt, an important material currently under the direct control of the Executive Committee, for a comprehensive waterproof and anti-seepage treatment. .

Anxi had someone open one of the warehouses, which was full of sacks piled up to the ceiling.Randomly checked a few bags and showed them to everyone. They were filled with high-quality refined salt, and the inventory in such a warehouse was at least 50 million catties.

Immediately, impatient people began to ask Anxi whether the salt in this warehouse was for sale. Anxi smiled and said: "The salt in this warehouse has been reserved. If you are interested in buying, please ask the 'Fu Ruifeng' directly." Mr. Li is it."

Seeing everyone's eyes turned to him, Li Nai quickly cupped his fists and said, "Everyone, I didn't order this salt from the next one, and 'Fu Ruifeng' just did it for me. Among them are the Wang family of Nanxiong Prefecture, Shaozhou Qin’s family in Zhaoqing Prefecture, Li’s family in Zhaoqing Prefecture, Zeng’s family in Luoding Prefecture...there are always a dozen or so of them, and my family is just transporting them, please don’t misunderstand.”

Even if Li Nai is eloquent, this explanation is a little weak.This is not because what he said is not true. "Fu Ruifeng" has been operating private salt for more than half a year, and has gradually established a sales network in Guangdong Province.Most of the salt that was trafficked from Shengli Port to the mainland was resold to local merchants, and then distributed locally by these local snakes, instead of establishing their own in every place in the previous way of "Furuifeng". point of sale.

This mode of operation also comes from Schneider's instructions. The business department does not want "Fu Ruifeng" to control the sales of the entire salt industry in its own hands, but requires them to quickly occupy the market by developing distributors.Of course, the reason for doing this is not only for economic reasons, but also for safety considerations - if one day the competent authorities of Daming want to investigate this illegal salt sale, it will not only involve one or two households , but a large number of merchants throughout the entire sales area, greatly reducing the danger of the "Fu Ruifeng" family being blamed.Taking a step back, "Furuifeng" will really be investigated by then, and with the existence of other distributors, it will be less difficult for Haihan to rebuild its sales network.

The reason why "Furuifeng" gave up part of the profits and implemented it according to the sales strategy given by Haihan was also considering that its own strength was indeed a little weak. The local sale of private salt is likely to touch the interests of some local snakes and cause trouble.So after opening up the business routes in various prefectures and cities in Guangdong, "Furuifeng" began to transform, focusing on becoming an agent, and wholesaled the salt shipped to the mainland to other local distributors.

However, the other shareholders of "Qiong Lianfa" did not participate in the private salt trafficking before, so they did not know the inside story. Therefore, Li Nai's explanation sounds like some kind of excuse.

"Everyone, what Mr. Li said is indeed the truth." Anxi stood up at the critical moment and helped Li Nai explain: "Our sales strategy is to develop more distributors. In such a vast area as the mainland, Can the 'Furuifeng' family alone cover all the provinces in South China? Even if everyone here adds up, it may not be able to cover all the provinces in South China? So what we have to do is to establish sales rules, formulate sales prices, Control the sales network. As for selling salt, we don’t need to do it ourselves at all, just leave it to local merchants. This is not to distribute our profits to others, but to let more People come into this industry and help us make more money.”

Although there were quite a few uncommon words in what Anxi said, the people present basically understood most of them.Some people with flexible minds immediately figured out the beauty of it.Of course, there are also people with slower brains, who are still wondering why more people in this industry can increase their income.

Anxi didn't explain in detail at the moment. People from the commercial and trade department would naturally do ideological work for wealthy businessmen.The thing to do now is to show these wealthy businessmen the local salt production capacity.

The large-scale use of wind power and animal power irrigation devices in the Salt Field Commune has aroused great interest among wealthy businessmen. It is not difficult to imagine that with these efficient and convenient mechanical devices, the manpower required for salt production will be reduced, while the production efficiency will be greatly increased. Cost control is also possible.The mountain of refined salt piled up on the huge salt drying field makes the visitors feel amazed. Although the drying salt is not an advanced technology, the salt drying pool built by the Haihan people is better than the stone drying salt tank commonly used in the Daming Salt Field. Much more advanced.What ten salt workers in the Daming Salt Field do can be done well by two or three people here.At this time, the members of the inspection team gradually understood why Anxi had full confidence in the cost advantage of Haihan Refined Salt.

The living conditions of the members of the saltworks also made the inspection team look at the operational capabilities of the Haihan people with admiration.Most of the salt workers in the Daming Salt Field are poor and white. In many places, the salt workers will even flee on a large scale when they cannot survive, and the salt farms will be abandoned.However, these members of the Haihan Saltworks Commune live quite well. The houses in the villages they live in are all neat and uniform, obviously new houses built in a unified way. This alone is enough to compare with most of the Daming Saltworks.

After a brief look at the production situation of the Shengli Port Salt Field, the delegation returned to the seaside and continued to take two catamaran sailing boats to visit the local salt field in Tielu Port in the east.Next to the narrow waterway that enters Iron Furnace Harbor, a fortification has recently begun to be built. After completion, several small-caliber artillery may be placed in it as defensive firepower-this was also proposed by the military and police department many times before half a year ago. plans, and only recently have sufficient resources to implement them.

The construction of Iron Furnace Port started in mid-October last year, and it has been nearly half a year now.In the past six months, the Executive Committee has arranged for thousands of immigrants to settle in Iron Furnace Port. The local area has become the first and second communes of Iron Furnace Port, and the initial development of agriculture and salt industry has been carried out in the harbor area.At present, nearly [-] mu of salt fields have been built. Although it is not as large as the Shengli Port Salt Field Commune, it has a better geographical environment and does not even need special lifting and irrigation facilities. The seawater can be completed just by the daily ebb and flow of the tide. The production cost of the lifting irrigation operation is much lower than that of the Shengli Port Salt Field.Compared with Shengli Port in the west, Iron Furnace Port has greater development potential. According to estimates, the salt field here will be three times the size of the Shengli Port Salt Field in the future, and its production capacity is estimated to be more than four times.

Agriculture has also made great progress. The Ministry of Agriculture has specially formulated a salt-alkali-resistant crop planting plan for the Tielugang area, which has achieved certain results. The harvested salt-alkali-resistant vegetables began to be used as daily supplies during the Annan expedition. Delivered regularly to the local market.At the same time, the two communes are also cooperating with the former Fushan Dongli people who moved to the nearby ravines to build a land passage from Tielu Port to Tiandu area.At present, this dirt road with a total length of [-] miles has been basically connected, but the transportation capacity is limited, and it is temporarily unable to transport heavy and bulky goods, but it has basically met the design requirements of the Executive Committee——as an extreme , the passage for the residents of Iron Furnace Port to retreat to the inland of Tiandu.

The population of the Tielugang area is four times that of the Shengligang Salt Field Commune. In addition to the commune's management organization, supporting medical, educational, public security, military and other institutions have also been established here.Of course, compared to Victory Harbor, the organization here is relatively simple and crude.For example, the medical institution is a small clinic where four doctors take turns to treat patients. Some difficult and miscellaneous diseases can only be treated in Shengli Port by a cargo ship carrying supplies.Educational institutions do not have a complete set-up like Shengligang Primary School. They are just a few literacy classes run by the public. Classes start every other day, and the educational objects are mainly school-age children who are not yet able to work.

Compared with the Victory Port area, because the immigrants who moved to Iron Furnace Port are mainly North Vietnamese refugees and there are a large number of family structures, the proportion of children here is much higher than that in the Victory Port area.However, due to the limited awareness of the public in this era, although most of the residents here have obtained the native place of naturalized people, most of them are not willing to send their children to Shengli Port, which has better conditions, and would rather let them study locally. A literacy class or something.Although Ning Qi, who is in charge of education, has put forward rectification opinions on this situation at the executive committee many times, but in the end, he is still limited by the current shortage of teachers, and there is no way to open a formal teaching institution in Iron Furnace Port for the time being.

In contrast, the public security agencies in the Iron Furnace area quickly entered into their roles. Long before the large numbers of immigrants from the North Vietnamese area moved back, the executive committee had already transferred a group of local-trained local security personnel from Black Earth Port. When he came back, he was responsible for the grassroots security affairs of Iron Furnace Port.Now there is a grass-roots police station in Iron Furnace Port. There are more than [-] public security police officers officially established, half of them are North Vietnamese immigrants, and the other half are composed of Ming, Li and Miao people.Iron Furnace Port also set up a reduced version of the labor camp. Those who were arrested for violating laws and disciplines in the local area were directly sent to the local labor camp to serve labor—the fortifications that the inspection team saw when they entered Iron Furnace Port. It is these reform-through-labour prisoners who are doing the construction.

The military defense force of Iron Furnace Port was not stationed near the commune, but on the hillside where Iron Furnace Port entered the sea.The top of the mountain at an altitude of 150 meters is the commanding height that can look out over ten nautical miles nearby, and the waterway fortifications are under construction at the foot of the mountain, and daily supplies are carried out by cargo ships entering Iron Furnace Port.Although the Military Commission has only deployed one platoon of troops here, considering the terrain at the mouth of the Iron Furnace Port where one man guards the sea and the other cannot open, the strength of this one platoon is enough to take on the task of daily defense.

The delegation's interest in the Iron Furnace Port area is obviously greater than that of the previous site, perhaps because most of the immigrants here are from Annan.Curious people began to ask the people how they came to settle here across the sea.As for the production status of the Iron Furnace Salt Field, because it is basically the same as the Shengli Port Salt Field, everyone just read it hastily, but they have no interest in studying it.After all, salt is a good thing, but if you look at it too much, you will get tired of it. After looking at the white salt field for several hours, everyone feels that their eyes are about to be blinded.

After visiting Iron Furnace Port, Schneider, who accompanied the delegation, checked the time. It was too late to go to the Inland River Port area in the west, so he temporarily changed the plan and arranged for the delegation to visit the sugarcane planting base in the Yalong Bay area on the return journey. .Originally, because it had not yet entered the harvest period, it was not included in the list of places to visit at the beginning, but the effect of this temporary arrangement was unexpectedly good. All shareholders were very fond of this sugarcane forest with an area of ​​over a thousand acres. Showed a strong interest, and immediately began to ask Schneider about the sugar production process after the harvest period.

(End of this chapter)