Rise of the 1630s South America

Chapter 1585 West Indian Ocean ([-])

"Of course, our Xinhua Island welcomes officers and non-commissioned officers with combat experience." At the welcome reception in Xinhua Port, Huang Yi, the leader of the island's pioneering team, also took a rare time to attend and toasted everyone. He said: "There are many people here. Opportunities, there are plenty of prospects, but what is lacking are talents and funds. To be honest, Huang is very grateful that you can come to us to develop, and will definitely give you a very good return. Please wait and see."

In fact, most of the people attending the reception today are retired military officers who immigrated from the mainland or other overseas colonies. Some of them are from the mainland, some are from South Africa, and some are from the Far East like Junio’s subordinates. And of course ex-Ganishari or Spasi officers who came in exile with their families from the Ottoman Empire.These people came early and late, the early ones have been here for more than half a year, and the late ones have just arrived. They are basically distributed around Xinhua Port. This meeting was called to hold a reception, thanking them for choosing Xinhua Island.

To be honest, the current Xinhua Island has a considerable demand for all kinds of professional and technical personnel—especially military personnel. The guards of the major state-run plantations need officers and non-commissioned officers, and the settlements need training and organization. The talents of the militia, and the expansion of the scale of battles with the natives required more warriors with battle experience. All of this destined that Xinhua Island's thirst for military talents could not be completely satisfied no matter what.

What's more, now many people have heard that with the increasing investment of people from the east coast in the southeast coast, a large number of businessmen began to migrate to the inland areas to find land for their own spice plantations, which naturally aggravated the conflict between the people on the east coast. Conflicts among local Antefazi, Antemoro and other aborigines.The relationship between the two parties is no longer the "sweetness" that they had when they jointly targeted the French, but has become somewhat tense, and several small-scale conflicts have occurred, and some people have been killed or injured.

In order to cope with the increasingly severe situation on the southeast coast, with the approval of Huang Yi, the leader of the New China Exploration Team, the East Coast people specially established the second district-level administrative unit on the island—Zelu District (the first is Daqing District).The jurisdiction of the Zelu area is relatively long and narrow, roughly located on the southeast and east coasts of the island, including Daze County, Lu'an County (recently established, including the three settlements of Lu'an Township, Gaoping Township, and Xiachuan Township), Gaodu County ( Recently established, it governs the two settlements of Gaodu Town and Danchuan Township), and the three counties have a total population of more than 5000. Economically, coffee (Arabica species, mostly located in the mountainous area of ​​Daze County in the southeast, Gein local The climate and soil are very suitable), pepper and other spices are mainly planted, which is a typical plantation economy.

In recent years, as the "Legend of Wealth" of Xinhua Island has become increasingly popular on the east coast, many people have money in their pockets—but not too much money, because if there is a lot of money, it is enough to invest directly in the local area. It is necessary to come to the colony to try your luck—starting to come to Xinhua Island in small groups and gangs, and then grant a 50-year leasehold right from the government for a piece of land for plantation, and start your own wealth adventure journey of.

There is no doubt that their funds are generally not too sufficient, so many people teamed up to go far from the coast and go deep into the inland to capture all kinds of natives on New China Island and use them as labor force for plantations.And as there are more and more people like this, the desire for slaves is naturally increasing, so the conflict between the two sides is inevitable, first it is a battle at the village level, and then it rises to the tribe level, and now it is It is already necessary to dispatch the New China Infantry Battalion from the East Bank to assist in the battle, otherwise the situation may deteriorate further.

But the New China Infantry Battalion has only a thousand people, and it is needed in every place. It is really exhausting. Therefore, the three counties of Tacheng, Mianhe, and Xinhua set up reserve organizations such as local garrison teams, and then established a militia system. , is the right way.And these undoubtedly required a large number of military talents. This was the main reason why Huang Yi took the time to attend the welcome reception - to show that he attached importance to it and attract more people to come.

"What's the situation in the coffee market recently?" After attending the reception and finishing the toast, Huang Yi took the secretary back down, then returned to her office, asked the secretary to make a cup of tea, and asked about economic issues: "Business The people in the system told me that the Ottoman Empire has banned coffee again, which has a great impact on our sales situation? I don’t have the latest data at hand, so I want to know how much impact this has had?”

"Captain, coffee is currently ranked second in the island's list of export commodities. Last year, the amount of exports to the mainland alone was about 21.4 yuan, and there is still room for further growth. All in all, It is a very important export commodity. At present, the main planting areas are on the large slopes close to the plateau in the inland of Tacheng County and the mountainous area in the southeast of the island. These two places are very suitable for both soil, environment and climate. The growth of coffee beans, so the planting area is quite large, and the resulting economic benefits cannot be underestimated." When the secretary heard the question from his chief officer, he immediately listed a bunch of data. There is still quite a lot of homework, which makes Huang Yi somewhat satisfied.

Here I have to mention that after years of development, the plantation economy of Xinhuaxia Island has become increasingly close to the local economy, as can be seen from the data on import and export trade—last year (1669 284.7) throughout the year, Xinhua Island exported a total of 71 million yuan of various commodities to the mainland on the east coast, of which sucrose topped the list at 69.6 yuan, followed by cotton at 35.5 yuan, almost equally; the third place It is pepper, which is 21.4 yuan (this is due to the great development of the local meat industry); the fourth place is coffee, which is 17.5 yuan, but the growth momentum is relatively rapid, and the share of coffee in the beverage market is also high. Rising rapidly; behind coffee are sisal, wood, cocoa, rubber, respectively 17.1 yuan, 14 yuan, 13.6 yuan and 10 yuan. These are the four trade volumes of 10 yuan. Others such as vanilla, clean coal, seafood, and dried fruit are all less than [-] yuan, so I won't list them one by one.

And this is only the export figure. In fact, the amount of commodities imported by Xinhua Island from the mainland is quite large every year, although the majority of them are entrepot trade-this is due to the partial profit from the local side. Most of the companies registered in the mainland are generally registered in the mainland. Xinhua Island is completely a warehouse, a transshipment warehouse, and there is no profit. , allowing some trading companies to transfer their registration to Xinhua Island, which undoubtedly promoted the prosperity of the island's economy and enhanced the financial strength of the pioneering team and even the county government.

To be honest, such a scale of import and export trade is indeed quite amazing.Xinhuaxia Island has more than 20 people and less than 80 citizens, and the value created has even surpassed that of the British North American colony ([-] million pounds per year), and it has become the richest overseas colony of the East China Republic.It's no wonder that some British and Dutch businessmen have already requested to come here to do business. It's really rich here, so people can't help but be tempted.Not to mention, the above-mentioned trades have also brought relatively rich financial revenue to Xinhua Island, allowing them to have sufficient capital to start some infrastructure construction, such as the crucial Daqing Railway Project, such as the long-awaited project on the east coast. Tadong Railway plan and so on.

Okay, now let's turn the topic back to coffee.

Of course, Huang Yi knows that 21.4 yuan is not the total export value of Xinhua Island's coffee industry, because most of the island's coffee exports are still exported to foreign countries, more precisely, the Ottoman Empire, Persia and Oman, of which Ottoman accounts for The vast majority of the share, followed by Persia, Oman is almost nonexistent.

However, export is not without problems. The biggest uncertainty is probably the policy change. For example, the Ottoman Empire’s repeated actions to ban coffee shops will always lead to a large sales of coffee beans exported to the east coast during that period. fall.As for the Safavid dynasty in Persia, doing business there also depends on the relationship between the two countries. Once the relationship between the two countries is bad (mostly because of Ottoman), then not only cane sugar and coffee cannot be exported to Persia, but a large amount of raw silk, Goods such as porcelain, livestock, spices, blankets, etc. will also be cut off, which is very uncomfortable.

But in any case, Ottoman and Persia together can consume more than 50 yuan of cane sugar and coffee products every year, which is definitely a huge market for these two industries in Xinhua Island, so any trouble in the market is worth it People on the east coast pay attention.No, as soon as the Ottoman Empire banned coffee shops (it was already a repeated game), the commercial stations or other intelligence-gathering agencies set up by the people on the east coast immediately fed back the news.

"However, based on the summarization of news from both the Port of Suez and the Port of Mocha, the banning of cafes may not take too long, because it will end in a year or even a few months. At least, Suez is currently The Ottoman merchants in Hong Kong still have not significantly reduced the purchase of coffee. Whether it is ours or the local coffee in Northeast Africa, most of them have been successfully sold, although the price has indeed dropped by about a quarter. In addition, Mocha Port (It is also a coffee distribution center, but in recent years it has been greatly impacted by the Port of Suez, coupled with the silting of the port, the trade volume is not as good as before, and it is only struggling to maintain it at present) It is also continuing to purchase coffee produced in the plateau area across the strait, Price fluctuations are also very small. Therefore, we can clearly judge that the impact of this storm should be manageable, unlike the storm four years ago, this time it should not bankrupt many small and medium-sized traders or plantation owners. The secretary continued to report to Huang Yi and said: "So, I think that the strategy of continuing to expand the area of ​​coffee plantations and marching into the inland mountainous areas formulated a while ago does not need to be greatly adjusted, because it is completely in line with the market. need."

"Really? More and more people in China are drinking coffee now. Besides alcohol, coffee is the second most popular drink after green tea, right? It has firmly surpassed yerba mate and cocoa. It is indeed a It’s not a small market.” Huang Yi said with a slight smile while turning the pen in her hand: “If one day we can squeeze out the market share of wine, it will really be a big industry. That's a lot."

"Well, take a look at my schedule for the past two days, and find a way to arrange a meeting for me. I want to coordinate and deploy the next stage of the island's action plan." Huang Yi pulled a piece of paper on the table, While writing on it, he said: "The topic of the meeting is the points I wrote. In fact, it is nothing. It is to discuss the allocation of military resources in the second half of the year. Xiao Peng (Peng Yuanzhi) will soon be appointed as the commissioner of the Zelu District Administrative Office. I proposed to launch troops against the native tribal alliance in the mountains, but I did not agree after comprehensive consideration. But now it seems that this decision is indeed a bit conservative. The Manab Kingdom in the south is completely out of date, and Saqqara in the Boyla Kingdom Wayi, old and young, can't cause us enough trouble. The Merina people have some ideas, but they can't reach them. Therefore, now is the best time to take action against the Antaimoro and other tribes. The only thing to worry about is probably The attitudes of the Bala and Mahafali people on the arid plateau in the south have changed, but it is not a big deal. This meeting is very important, and cadres above the Xinhua infantry battalion company, the head and deputy head of the Xinhua County Security Corps, and other military cadres are not allowed to Absent, the content and resolutions of the meeting, copy a copy to the Daqing area and Zelu area, and ask them to start intensive actions according to the spirit of the meeting, there must be no mistakes."

The secretary hesitated after hearing the words, but he didn't say anything, nodded and arranged to go.In fact, he just thought of the fact that the Omanis have become more aggressive along the coast of East Africa recently, and they have faintly confronted the people on the east coast on many occasions; he even thought of the fact that the British East India Company colluded with the Portuguese to vigorously manage the ports on the coast of Mozambique.It's just that these things don't seem to be so important that they need to be dealt with immediately. In comparison, perhaps cleaning up internal unstable factors to better occupy the entire island is more important to Captain Huang.

After all, although there are a lot of gold, ivory, and slaves that are traded on the coast of East Africa every year, they are not stable enough, and the total amount is just that. It is far from being compared with the lucrative and stable plantations. Good decision.Besides, the monitoring and targeting of the Omanis, Portuguese and British should be a matter of the Second Fleet of the Navy, and it has nothing to do with ground military operations that rely more on the Army, and it will not affect anything.

I would like to recommend two new books by my friends: "Lazy Tang" and "The Resurgence of the Great Ming Empire". They are both written by old historical authors. I hope you like them.

(End of this chapter)