Rebirth of Bayi Fishing and Hunting in the Northwest

Chapter 1225 If you're unlucky, just follow those who are lucky.
After dinner, it was already dark. Li Qingxia refused Li Long's offer to see her off and slowly walked back with her hands behind her back.

Although there were no streetlights, the snow was quite thick, and the sunlight reflecting off the snow made it possible to see the road clearly.

Moreover, the police station is right across the street, and the recycling station is a short walk away, so there's nothing to worry about.

As they were getting ready for bed, Li Long told Gu Xiaoxia about Xu Haijun's desire to join the cooperative.

Gu Xiaoxia had just finished washing her feet, poured out the water, and returned to the bedside, smiling as she said:

"Xu Haijun is quite clever. He's been making a lot of moves these past two years, and it seems he realized he couldn't succeed on his own, so he decided to rely on you guys."

"That's true, he's been quite busy these past two years. Making big broom handles, clearing wasteland, hunting in the north... but he can't hunt now."

"So, he feels that there are fewer and fewer jobs that can make money. Now that you've started to set up cooperatives, he probably realizes that in the end, farmers still have to make money in the fields, so he wants to partner with you."

"Smart enough." Li Long nodded.

“In ancient times, he would have thought that ‘when one person attains enlightenment, even his chickens and dogs ascend to heaven,’” Gu Xiaoxia said with a smile. “In modern times, it’s that if you’re not good enough, then you should find someone who is.”

"How could I be considered an immortal?" Li Long chuckled, pulling back the covers as he said, "At most, I'm just a bit lucky."

"To put it nicely, you're being modest; to put it bluntly, you're being unduly humble." Gu Xiaoxia didn't mince words with him. "The changes our family has made in just a few years can't be attributed to luck alone."

A few days ago, when I picked up Mingming and Haohao, I ran into their classmates' mothers and we chatted about this. They all said our family was well-off. I said that I only have such a good life because I'm with you.

In their eyes, how could this be? Many people thought I was a government official and you were just a temporary worker; some even said you were marrying above your station. Actually, I know very well that you are very capable, and if you joined the organization, you would definitely do a great job.”

"How could that be?" Li Long waved his hand. "With my qualifications, I wouldn't be able to get by in this company."

“You’re underestimating yourself again.” Gu Xiaoxia pulled back the covers and lay down, saying, “Your interpersonal skills are also a skill. I feel that most cadres simply don’t possess that ability.”

"Look at you back when you were still in the team, selling fish and mountain products, you were able to build relationships with all those section chiefs, department heads, and directors, and they were all willing to help you. That kind of ability isn't something just anyone can have..."

Li Long smiled and said nothing more.

“If it were one of the older ladies in my workplace who isn’t a Party member, she’d say I must have done something incredibly good in my past life to have such a smooth life like this,” Gu Xiaoxia said, turning and putting her arm around Li Long’s. “The envy she showed when she said that made me feel so good…hehe…”

Li Long thought to himself, "You must have had a tough life in your past life."

But no matter what, as long as the two of them support each other through thick and thin and live a good life, that's enough.

The next day, after breakfast, Li Long drove to the fourth team.

The snow in the fields was already quite thick, and the snow on the roads was also compacted. At this time, there were no professional snow removal teams, so the only way to clear snow from roads like this was to use passing vehicles to compact it.

The snow was compressed into ice, making the roads extremely slippery. Large vehicles without snow chains could easily slide down slopes. It's not easy for cars to get up here in the dead of winter.

After driving back to the fourth team, Li Long first went to his elder brother's house. He believed that Xie Yundong and Xu Haijun would arrive soon.

When Li Long arrived, his elder brother Li Jianguo called him into the house, wanting to hear his thoughts on the cooperative.

“Yesterday Yundong said some things, but not in detail. Maybe the Navy was there, so he couldn’t say more. Tell me, how did you manage to set up this cooperative?”

“Actually, it’s not just me,” Li Long said as he entered the house, sat down, poured himself a cup of tea, and said, “I was thinking that we should all join the cooperative together, with those 280 mu of land. If that works out, we can also join the cooperative to grow cotton on the rest of the land.”

"You, your sister-in-law, and Junhai can cultivate the rest of our wheat fields over there. Since there are many of them coming, they can also work and earn money at the cooperative."

"Work to earn money?" Li Jianguo frowned. The old cooperative was different from the current one. The earliest mutual aid groups were formed by neighbors helping each other, creating the most basic mutual aid organizations. When farming, they would concentrate their efforts to finish one household's work before moving on to the next, or those with more people would help those with fewer people, and those with farm tools would help those without.

However, both the land and the farming tools belong to their original owners.

Later, the primary cooperatives were somewhat similar to what Li Long is talking about now. They used land and farm tools as shares. The land was still owned by individuals, but the right to use it belonged to the cooperative. Profits were made through dividends and labor remuneration.

That's pretty much it compared to what Li Long has said. However, Li Long introduced the method of hiring external workers, so that the company's employees can work to earn money, or they can choose not to work; it's voluntary.

This clause is slightly broader and more flexible.

In fact, several decades ago, there was an advanced cooperative, which was during the transition from the primary cooperative to the people's commune. At that time, due to political factors, the land was directly considered collectively owned, dividends were abolished, and distribution was based solely on labor. This basically marked the beginning of a fully socialist stage.

However, because farming involved low technology and yielded low profits, coupled with the prevailing social conditions at the time, it quickly transitioned to a people's commune system, and neither its advantages nor disadvantages became apparent.

The cooperative that Li Long described was roughly the same as the original primary cooperative, without too many external factors. After hearing this, Li Jianguo's brows relaxed, thinking that there shouldn't be any problems.

The two brothers discussed the specific details further. Li Long mainly talked while Li Jianguo listened, occasionally offering his own opinions and making minor adjustments based on the changes in the cooperative over the past and the present era.

Many cooperatives in later generations became highly specialized, integrating production and sales, and some even incorporated processing.

However, the cooperatives of the fourth team in later generations were still similar to primary cooperatives, only involved in production, processing and export, because the cotton was directly transported to the ginning mill after being picked, and nothing else was managed.

It's very different from those cooperatives that specialize in local products.

Fortunately, the structure is relatively simple, making it easy to manage, and dividends are clearly visible.

Li Long thought that if he accumulated enough wealth or if the cooperative's capital reached a certain level, he could set up a cotton ginning factory after the county cotton and linen company ceased to exist.

Even if you can control the price yourself, at least you won't be so mistreated.

To put it bluntly, even in later generations, when the fourth team established several cooperatives to grow cotton and made a profit every year because of the large amount of land, they were still treated like punching bags back then.

Private cotton ginning mills colluded with each other, suppressing whoever offered the highest price. Gradually, these mills were acquired by a few owners from the same region, who then collectively drove down prices, leaving only the farmers to suffer.

The price is whatever others set; there's no right to haggle.

Now Li Long can sell agricultural supplies. If he can set up a cotton ginning factory, even if it only buys cotton from his own cooperative, he won't be so mistreated.

The idea is good, of course, but we'll have to see how things go. Li Long doesn't want to become a capitalist; he just doesn't want to be controlled by others.

He felt that he was essentially still a farmer, unable to see too far ahead, but also unable to tolerate too much idleness.

As the two brothers were discussing their plan, they heard the sound of a car outside.

Soon, Li Long heard voices in the courtyard. He recognized them as Xie Yundong and Xu Haijun.

"Brother Li, Xiao Long, we're here." Xie Yundong called out from the courtyard, then pushed open the door and entered.

Li Long greeted them at the doorway of the inner room, and as they entered, he smiled and said:

"Come in, come in and sit down."

Xie Yundong and Xu Haijun went inside and sat down. After greeting Li Jianguo, Li Jianguo stood up and said:
"You guys chat, I have something to do outside."

"No, no, no, brother, I'll take them to the front yard to talk," Li Long said hurriedly. "The front yard is quiet."

“That works too,” Li Jianguo said. “Junfeng and the others have set up the stove in the front yard, so it won’t be cold when you come in.”

Xie Yundong and the others then followed Li Long to the front yard.

Outside, it was a world of ice and snow, but inside, it was warm and cozy.

A pot of tea remained warm on the stove. Xie Yundong said with a smile:

"Xiaolong, your house is really nice. Whether anyone is home or not, the stove is always warm."

"Hehehe." Li Long chuckled. They had just sat down when the door opened, and Li Junfeng came in carrying a plate of sunflower seeds, placed it on the table, and said:
"Uncle Long, Lao Xie, Haijun, these are some spiced melon seeds that my wife cooked a couple of days ago when she had nothing else to do. Try them."

"Alright, alright, Junfeng, you sit down too," Xie Yundong said with a smile. "There's nothing much going on right now."

"You guys chat, the kids at home are really naughty, I have to keep an eye on them." After saying that, Li Junfeng nodded to Li Long and turned to leave.

Their feelings differed, but none of them spoke of it.

Li Long fetched the teapot, poured three cups of water, put the teapot back, and said:

"Tell me, what's going on?"

“I was drinking with Dacheng and the others a few days ago, and I heard Dacheng say that you guys are planning to set up a cooperative. So I asked Brother Yundong for details. I think this is a good thing.”

When we farmers first started farming under the household responsibility system, things were alright. But later, we realized that going it alone wasn't enough; we couldn't compete with large-scale farmers. They had loans to buy machinery and could operate on thousands of acres of land.

"We have dozens of acres of land, and if we earn a few dozen yuan per acre, that's already a lot. But people with thousands of acres, even if they only earn ten yuan per acre, they're still much better off than us."

At this point, Xu Haijun sighed and said:
"Now everyone has enough to eat. Growing grain can feed you, but it doesn't make you money. If you want to get rich, you have to grow cash crops. Growing cash crops, like melon seeds, is okay if you get a harvest, but if you don't, you'll lose a lot of money."

As for growing cotton, it's better because there are cotton and linen companies that guarantee to buy the cotton. However, if you don't understand the techniques, a pest infestation could drastically reduce the cotton yield... Xiaolong, you understand the techniques, so we feel confident growing cotton with you."

Xu Haijun's words were all true, and Xie Yundong agreed that this made perfect sense.

This is not the era of later times, where technology can be easily found online. Computers are absolutely rare now. The first email in China was sent out just last year, but the Internet did not officially enter China until 1994.

Even now that the internet has arrived, there isn't the massive amount of information available online that we have in later generations.

If you want to farm using technology, you either have to learn it yourself or find someone to help you.

Self-study can be done with books, but the conditions in the fields are ever-changing, and relying solely on books is not enough to solve the problems.

The village's agricultural extension school had only just been established and hadn't yet left much of an impression on the local people, so it wasn't easy for them to trust it.

In the eyes of ordinary people, the experts and professors from the Agricultural College are the real experts. Professor Luo's visit really left a deep impression on the four teams. He is a true professor.

In the eyes of ordinary people, Li Long's ability to establish connections over there is quite remarkable.

Since the village was founded, no one from Team Four has been admitted to university (excluding Lao Gu, who was admitted from another place). People still have a lot of respect for university students.

Especially now that Lao Gu has gone to work in other places and is doing very well, what does that show? It shows that even if college students are quiet for a few years, they can still be very powerful when they come back.

This year, most cotton growers, except for a few who were affected by pests, made money; those with more land naturally made more.

After autumn, the Li family, Xie family, and three other families began to cultivate wasteland, all of which was saline-alkali land. Everyone knew this, and Xu Haijun and Xu Chengjun immediately followed suit and also cultivated saline-alkali land.

In their view, the Li family and the families related to the Li family were basically determined to grow cotton on saline-alkali land—because this year, dozens of acres of the Li family's 100 acres of cotton fields were saline-alkali land, and they had a good harvest.

During the autumn and winter irrigation season, they joined the Li family in flooding the saline-alkali land, washing away the surface salt and alkali and soaking out some of the salt and alkali inside.

The next step was to follow suit and see how the Li family did things.

If you're not capable, then just follow someone who is.

As a result, a few days ago, Xu Haijun overheard Liang Dacheng letting slip while drinking that his family and others were planning to form a cooperative, and he was immediately interested.

Over the past few years, he has come to admire Li Long's ability to make money and his ability to see the big picture, and he no longer has any desire to compete or challenge him.

As long as I can make money, that's fine.

Xu Chengjun actually thought the same thing, but as a team leader, it wasn't appropriate for him to join someone else's cooperative. He wanted Xu Haijun to explore the situation first.

As for the other members of the Xu family, their relationship isn't that close. Even if they came, the other family probably wouldn't agree. Xu Haijun and Li Long are, after all, of the same generation and used to have a good relationship.

Xu Haijun now regrets returning from the army early, feeling too ashamed to admit that following Li Long was not as good as doing things on his own.

If we had relied on Li Long back then, wouldn't we be able to earn more now?

Look at Xie Yundong. Although he's older than Li Long, he has a clear understanding of his own position. He's making money by following Li Long, so there's nothing wrong with that—is face more important than making money? Does being older necessarily mean you'll be in a leadership position?
That's nonsense.

At this point, the right thing to do is to think about how to make the most of our lives.

Upon hearing Xu Haijun's words, Xie Yundong looked at Li Long with some apology, realizing that they hadn't kept their mouths shut and hadn't protected the secret.

However, Li Long didn't care about that. To be honest, if a cooperative were to be established, as soon as preparations began, everyone else would know by the end of this winter.

What surprised him was that Xu Haijun dared to approach at this time, which required a certain amount of courage.

“Navy, have you thought this through? If you really want to join, not only will you have to contribute your land, but you will also have to raise a large sum of money as agricultural supplies in the early stages. You won’t see any money before next autumn harvest, and the investment will be considerable. Moreover, if the autumn harvest is not good, not to mention dividends, you might even lose money.”

Li Long wasn't trying to scare Xu Haijun; the main issue was that the land they were planning to pool their resources to join the cooperative was almost entirely saline-alkali land.

Although the saline-alkali land in the four teams is basically the same in composition, no one can say for sure that they are completely identical.

This year's irrigation washed away some of the salt and alkali, which is a good thing. If the fertilizer is used correctly next year, and after sowing and replanting, a seedling survival rate of over 70% can be considered satisfactory.

But what if the target isn't met? Then there's no point in replanting.

So even though Li Long discussed it with Xie Yundong and the others several times and they were all very excited, these people all have family wealth, and Li Long has the confidence to back them up.

Xu Haijun is different; he's a layer away from everyone else. If he really wanted to join, Li Long wouldn't be the bad guy to refuse him, but he needed to make sure his initial words were clear.

He can't guarantee that he'll get things done; everything has risks, and farming is no exception.

"Xiaolong, don't underestimate me. Since I want to join the society, I've definitely thought through all the pros and cons. How can you make money without any risk? Besides, all the risks we take are legal and compliant. When we all come together, we share the risks, so the chances of us succeeding are greater."

He paused and continued:

“Actually, any job that makes money these days involves risk. Originally, I planned to go to the sandy areas in the north to hunt and skin gazelles this winter, but now that the animal protection law has been passed, hunting gazelles is no longer allowed.”

While the legal system is becoming increasingly完善 (perfect/comprehensive), the ways for us to make money are dwindling. What can we do? Fortunately, our fourth team has a lot of land. Xiaolong, you've managed to develop this saline-alkali land into a place where we can grow cotton. If I don't seize this opportunity, I'll really be a fool.”

Li Long understood what Xu Haijun meant. The previous times Li Long had helped Xie Yundong and the others make money, Xu Haijun could only learn from the sidelines; because their relationship wasn't strong enough, he didn't earn much.

Now is a critical moment. If he doesn't come now, he'll probably fall behind in the future.

"I know my relationship with everyone isn't quite there yet, and I'm sure you're all wondering why I'm shamelessly asking to join. How about this: I'll contribute a thousand more than everyone else in the initial investment. What do you think?"

Of course, contributing this thousand is just to express my opinion. As for the other land and agricultural supplies converted into shares, I won't ask for more, just like everyone else. As for my position in the cooperative, I'll do whatever position I'm given, is that alright?

His words surprised not only Xie Yundong, but also Li Long.

A thousand yuan isn't a lot, but it's not a small amount either.

I could buy dozens of bags of fertilizer now.

There aren't many types of agricultural supplies available now, and prices haven't gone up. You can buy enough agricultural supplies for a thousand yuan to cultivate dozens of acres of land without any problem.

They really have sincerity.

(End of this chapter)