Father can be an enemy country

Chapter 1028 A big game of chess

When those Mukui first heard that Shexiang and Liu Shuzhu actually took the initiative to offer discounts, they were still lamenting in their hearts. Girls are really outgoing, how can they use the interests of the clan to please their lover?

Fortunately, in order to please the two Ju Mu, the prince insisted on giving them a high price...

Ma Junze and the others secretly sighed that these chieftains were so stupid that they actually regarded the prince as their love interest. Little did they know that the conditions proposed by the prince today had been carefully considered in advance.

There are two types of roads to be built in Yunnan, one is built by the government, and the other is built by the chieftains. The former one costs one hundred stones per mile and has no faults. Although the latter kind can be done by prostitutes and let them repair it for free. But if they really wait for them to cultivate slowly by themselves, they won’t be able to cultivate until the year of the monkey and the month of the horse.

The road needs to be smooth across the board. As long as there is a delay in construction, the entire road will be useless. Zhu Zhen contracted the entire project to the chieftain in sections. The biggest problem was here. It was almost foreseeable that certain sections would be delayed, resulting in the overall failure to be completed.

Shuidong and Shuixi are used to overcome difficulties and help get through the trump card that delays the construction period. The value of their work will be extremely high by then. The prince will give them a hundred stones per mile, which is not much at all.

As the prince said, as long as the roads in Yunnan are fully connected as soon as possible, it will be worthwhile no matter how much money is spent.

Moreover, in this way, Shuidong and Shuixi were firmly tied to the imperial court, and they could gradually be Hanized, which was crucial to the stability of the entire Guizhou region.

~~

In fact, there are several Ma Junzes, but they only know one but not the other.

Yunnan obviously produces copper, so why did Zhu Zhen pay with grain instead of copper coins?

Because he wants to find a new market for grain from Huguang and Jiangxi.

The reason why people in Jiangnan are no longer in a hurry to cash in their food stamps is also very simple - because food prices have risen again.

At that time, Zhu Zhen used the excuse of needing to prepare cash, and agreed with the people that the payment date was one year later, that is, in June this year.

Naturally, no one would hoard any more. Instead, large households sold off their stored grains. This came and went, and the price of grains suddenly dropped from two levels to one level.

As a result, grain-based food stamps also devalued significantly, causing complaints from the people in Jiangnan. In the end, Zhu Zhen had to return from Japan urgently and announced that a year later, in addition to being redeemable for grain at face value, food stamps could also be exchanged for one stone. The standard exchange of food stamps for two taels of silver into cash stabilized the uproar.

What happened to the food stamp crisis that broke out last spring? Isn't it because the Dyeing and Weaving Bureau's farms in Huguang and Jiangxi are on the right track, which has completely changed people's expectations for food prices in Jiangnan. Everyone believes that with the launch of large-scale planting in Huguang, Jiangxi, the food shortage in Jiangnan will disappear forever.

However, it is already October, and the run expected by the big investors has not appeared. In more than three months, a total of more than two million taels of silver have been exchanged, which is completely trivial.

A major event happened in the second half of last year, that is, the imperial court conquered Yunnan in the south, and Boss Zhu made a false shot and shifted the main attack direction from Guangdong and Guangxi to Huguang.

According to the Ming army's rule of supplying supplies nearby, Huguang and neighboring Jiangxi became the main force in providing food and grass for the army conquering the south. At that time, no one knew how long this battle would last, so it was necessary to hoard food and grass as much as possible. Therefore, at the suggestion of a certain prince, Boss Zhu temporarily banned the transportation of food from Huguang and Jiangxi.

As a result, the people in Jiangnan have been talking about the autumn grains from Huguang and Jiangxi for almost a year, but not a single grain has been shipped to Jiangnan. It's a lot of fun now.

Because of the previous low-price selling, the entire Jiangnan people were in a state of food shortage. Large households and grain dealers ran out of grain in their warehouses and began to rush to buy grain everywhere. The price of grain began to rise day by day.

Fortunately, in order to stabilize grain prices, the Dyeing and Weaving Bureau opened grain harvesting. There was enough grain in the warehouse and it opened the warehouse to sell grain at the right time, so there was no grain shortage. However, the rise in grain prices is obviously beneficial to the Weaving and Dyeing Bureau, so they do not release grain at a fast pace, leaving the market in a state of slight shortage. This has also been the norm in Jiangnan for the past hundreds of years.

So a year later, the price of food returned to the normal state that it had been for hundreds of years, and became two to one stone again. Moreover, ordinary people chase the rise and kill the fall. When they see that food prices have entered the rising range, they are not in a hurry to cash their food stamps into cash.

This is what Zhu Zhen wants. He only has 30 million taels of reserve silver in hand, which is not enough to deal with a large-scale run. In a few years, when Japan's silver mines were successfully put into production and production capacity increased, he would have enough cash in hand and would no longer be afraid of runs. Even if the people don't cash in, he will take the initiative to make food stamps, a transitional currency with obvious flaws, withdraw from the stage of history.

But even then, Zhu Zhen will not let the price of food in Jiangnan be lower than two liang and one stone. Otherwise, Huguang and Jiangxi will be at a huge loss. Lao Liu grew grain not to benefit Jiangnan. After several years of development, Jiangnan has become rich enough, and it is time to get rich first and drive wealth later.

Zhu Zhen was not an emperor, so he could not use tools such as taxation. He could only achieve this by letting the people in Jiangnan continue to eat high-priced grains.

But he cannot always ban grain exports through administrative orders. He still has to find more markets for grain from Huguang, Jiangxi. For this reason, he even sold the grain to Jiuzhou despite being scolded... Although Jiuzhou was already a chief secretary of the Ming Dynasty, and there was no legal problem with selling grain to them, many people still couldn't accept it emotionally.

In order to avoid being scolded, Zhu Zhen now conducts re-export trade through Goryeo. He first sells grain to Goryeo, and then has his "good boy" sell it to Kyushu. Li Chenggui earned a vote in vain, although the cost was paid by Kyushu...

~~

But Kyushu alone, even if Korea is included, cannot eat 20% of the commercial grain of Huguang and Jiangxi. Zhu Zhen also needs to find new markets for the grain from the two provinces.

Yungui is the best place to go.

Selling grain to Yunnan and Guizhou not only won't cause any harm, but the distance is also close. Grains from Huguang in Jiangxi can be transported directly to Yuanzhou, and then along the newly built post road between Shuidong and Shuixi, they can be directly sent to Guizhou City.

After that, wherever roads are built, food can be transported, so that all Yunnan and Guizhou can eat rice from Huguang and Jiangxi. In this way, there will be no shortage of food in Yunnan and Guizhou, farmers in Huguang and Jiangxi will become rich, food prices in Jiangnan will also be stable, and everyone will have a bright future.

The only problem is that the natives in Yunnan and Guizhou are not only short of food, they are also poor. Expecting to make money from them is simply a dream.

Zhu Zhen knew this very well, so from the beginning, he did not expect to collect taxes from the chieftains, but let them contribute. Whether asking them to build roads, maintain roads, or serve as postmen at future post stations is all based on this consideration.

Moreover, the government will not let them work in vain and will provide them with food. This will undoubtedly greatly enhance the government's control over the chieftains.

So the grain was actually purchased by the government, and where did the government’s money come from? Of course it’s Yunnan Copper!

Now a perfect closed loop is formed. If the cycle continues, won't the economy improve?

(End of this chapter)