Reborn as King of South America

Chapter 506: Changes in Living Standards

The smooth road, about 6 meters wide and built with bricks, stones and cement, is visited by three-wheeled rickshaws, four-wheeled horse-drawn carriages, and two-wheeled carts pulled by mules and horses.

On the brand new cement road, the flow of people stretches into the distance. On both sides of the road, there are hawkers, merchants, and local farmers who are selling their surplus agricultural products.

Rolls of cotton and linen dyed in various colors were placed on the makeshift shop, and baskets filled with dragon fruit, snake fruit, milk apple, banana and other fruits were casually placed on the edge of the cement road.

A little further away from the cement road are circles of fenced-off cattle, sheep, alpacas, guanacos, mules, horses and other livestock. The owners of the livestock are negotiating prices with merchants from all over the local area and even overseas regions such as Southeast Asia and Europe.

As the 19th century came to an end and entered the 1890s, the world underwent earth-shaking changes due to the impact of the Industrial Revolution, the most obvious of which was the rapid increase in population.

In a hundred years, the world's total population doubled, Europe's population increased by 1 million, and the population in Argentina, two southern states of Brazil, Uruguay, southern Chile and other areas occupied by the Han State also increased from more than 100 million to 1800 million.

, the total population of the Far East has tripled to 4 million.

The surging population has reduced people's quality of life and increased the degree of social involution. The Far East, India, Japan, North Korea and other regions are all facing social problems brought about by the population explosion.

In Europe, countries such as Britain, Germany, France, and Italy, which completed the Industrial Revolution one after another, greatly enhanced their national strength. Relying on the progress and influence brought about by industrial development on transportation, military technology, etc., they expanded colonies around the world and moved their surplus population to large overseas colonies.

As an emerging country founded by immigrants, the Han Kingdom has a population growth quantity and degree that is more astonishing than that of European countries. However, unlike the Far East, India, North Korea and other regions, after more than 20 years since the founding of the country, the living standards of the people in the local area have not declined due to the continuous influx of immigrants, but have greatly improved.

Meat products such as beef, mutton, pork, chicken, and fish have become the common staple food of local civilians. New immigrant families who have moved to the local area not long ago can only eat meat every two or three days because they have not had much time to save money. However, those families who have immigrated to the local area for more than three years can eat meat every day.

As for families with an average per capita arable land area of ​​100 mu, or a family pasture area of ​​more than 1000 mu, meat has become a staple food like rice and wheat, and is available at every meal.

The staple foods are rice, wheat, and corn (Brazil is one of the world's top ten rice producing countries), meats include beef, mutton, and pork, and vegetables include tomatoes, green peppers, and beans.

Drinks include milk, goat milk, camel milk, etc.

The lives of the people in the native areas of the Han Dynasty not only got rid of the survival stage of filling their stomachs, but also moved towards a nutritionally balanced and healthy direction.

The improvement in the living standards of the native people of the Han State benefited from the following aspects.

First of all, the land area has increased. More than 90% of the land in the Laplace Plain has not been reclaimed. The arrival of Chinese immigrants has led to the reclamation of these high-quality lands with fertile soil and abundant rainfall into farmland and pastures.

In the local area, the per capita arable land and pasture area exceeds 200 mu, and this figure is increasing with the increase in reclaimed arable land, pasture and newly added land area.

Secondly, with the progress of industrial development, the promotion and application of steam machinery and chemical fertilizers in agriculture and animal husbandry have improved agricultural production efficiency and grain and livestock output per unit of arable land and pasture area.

Last but not least, it was the efficient leadership of the local government headed by Li Mingyuan and the brave and capable Han army that seized ample land for the local people and created a stable, peaceful space and time for development.

Under the overall planning of Li Mingyuan, the clean and efficient civil government has improved the transportation system mainly composed of shipping, railways, brick and stone, and cement roads, providing convenient and fast power for the industrial and commercial development in various parts of the country and even overseas.

The developed agriculture and animal husbandry not only improved the quality of life of the local people, but also the surplus grain and meat were exported to various places overseas. Among them, every time the official shipping fleet responsible for transporting ocean-going immigrants set off, half of the transport tonnage space would be reserved for loading grain.

The loaded food mainly consists of rice, wheat, as well as a small amount of frozen meat, canned food, vegetables, fruits, etc.

The other half of the transport tonnage is various industrial products.

The economic value of grain is low. After traveling tens of thousands of kilometers to the Far East, the profit is not as high as the economic value of transporting industrial products. However, the purpose of transporting grain on empty ships is not for its economic value, but to save more poor people.

In the Far East, food is hard currency. Transporting one more pound of food can allow a hungry poor person to live one more day, and one more shipload of food can save the lives of hundreds of hungry people.

The food that arrived with the fleet was transported to the immigration settlements set up in various parts of the Far East, and then cooked into rice porridge or fermented into steamed buns, and distributed free of charge to the surrounding hungry people and new immigrants. Whenever a new wave of immigrant fleets arrived, there would always be free rice porridge and steamed buns distributed, and the poor people who lined up to receive relief food would often form long lines.

Over the past twenty years, immigration settlements have gradually spread to coastal areas and even hundreds of kilometers inland. The frequency of providing relief to the poor has increased, and information about the Han country has been spread more and more widely. Then came the spontaneous influx of immigrants.

Some people passed the review of the immigration base and got the opportunity to board the official ocean-going ships and immigrate to South America without having to pay for the tickets and food, medical expenses during the voyage.

Due to the limitation of quota and fleet transport capacity, most people pay for their own tickets and sailing fees and take ships from South American, Southeast Asian, Western and other countries and regions to strive for the opportunity to travel to South America.

The expansion of the Han Dynasty's influence in the Far East naturally attracted the attention of the government in the areas where the immigrants lived. However, most of the Han governors and officials in various places turned a blind eye and acquiesced to the migration of the landless and poor people under their jurisdiction to the sea and join the Han Dynasty. On the one hand, this was because the poor were an unstable factor, and staying in the local area to join secret societies or riots would shake the government's rule. On the other hand, when the landless poor migrated away, the land left behind was just convenient for the officials and gentry to encroach on. There was no shortage of people in the Far East, and the departure of thousands, tens of thousands, millions, or tens of millions of people did not have much impact on the total population of 400 million. Even the number of the 10 or 20 million people who migrated was not as many as the number of people who died in the Taiping Rebellion.

What the Far East lacks is not the people, but the land to feed the people. In this regard, it is impossible to rely on the Qing court, and the only thing they can do is let the poor migrate overseas to find a way to survive. After all, the last time the Qing court banned the poor from going to sea, it caused a riot of refugees, which made the Han officials everywhere scared. That riot not only impacted the Qing court's government offices in various places, but also affected foreigners. Under pressure from foreigners, the Qing government finally bowed its head and acquiesced to the poor going out to sea.

The shadow of the South American Han Kingdom was present in the riot. The thousands of muskets and cannons alone caused the Qing army that suppressed it to suffer a great loss. In the end, with the tacit cooperation of both sides, the rioting refugees were "actively" repelled and retreated to Zhangzhou, Ningbo, Xiamen and other places, and sailed out to sea. Only then did the riot slowly subside.

Now that the Han Empire is even more powerful in Southeast Asia and the coastal areas of the Far East, local Han governors are even more reluctant to give up the profitable business of smuggling and offend the Han government behind the immigration bases, so they forcibly prohibit the poor from migrating to the sea.

A four-wheeled carriage flying the Han national flag and marked with the emblem of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs was also following the flow of traffic, moving slowly.

Sitting in the carriage were Han's Deputy Foreign Minister Tang Jingsong and his assistant. At the moment, he was resting with his eyes closed, while his assistant would occasionally open the curtain and look out through the window.

Like other areas of the Han Empire, Xianghe City (Posadas) is undergoing new and exciting changes every day.

Five years ago, when Tang Jingsong's assistant passed through Xianghe City on his first business trip, what he saw was a busy construction scene filled with dust and the roar of machinery. Five years later, the construction machines and workers are gone, and the simple tents and thatched houses built by the immigrants have been replaced with brick houses made of green and red bricks.

Factories and buildings were built on the originally empty land, and the green grassland was reclaimed into fertile fields full of rice, wheat, corn and other crops.

The originally quiet woods and grasslands are now filled with the cries of local people's cattle, sheep, chickens, geese and other livestock.

The muddy dirt roads were replaced by smooth concrete roads. Mules and horses could walk on the road without worrying about getting stuck in the gaps between bricks and damaging their hooves. Passengers sitting in carriages no longer had to suffer from bumps.

The assistant turned his head to look at Tang Jingsong who was resting with his eyes closed, and tried not to make any noise to avoid disturbing him.

Tang Jingsong was indeed tired. He had traveled non-stop from Chang'an (Cordoba) to Xianghe City (Posadas), so naturally he was not in good spirits.

After resting for about half an hour, I opened my eyes again and found that the carriage had entered the city. It was only three or five kilometers away from the final destination.

"Le'an, have you brought all the documents from Britain, Germany, France, the Far East, Southeast Asia, and other regions?"

Tang Jingsong looked at the assistant beside him and asked.

"Don't worry, Vice Minister. I checked again on the way and everything is there."

"Take it carefully. When you enter the front-line headquarters later, you will need to take it out and present it to His Majesty for review."

After regaining some spirit, Tang Jingsong opened the curtain in front of the car, glanced outside, and his mood became better.

Li Mingyuan was stationed in Xianghe City to command the war. Government affairs from all over the country were summarized in Chang'an and handled by the chief officers of the remaining departments. However, as the remaining Brazilian troops withdrew from Paraguay and the Han Kingdom occupied the entire territory of Paraguay, the work of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs suddenly increased a lot. The affairs from Britain, Germany, Austria-Hungary, France, and from the Far East, Southeast Asia, Korea and other places were piled on the table. Among them, many things had a great impact. Tang Jingsong did not dare to make the decision alone. The matter was complicated and involved too many factors. It would take a while to explain it clearly by sending a telegram. Therefore, Tang Jingsong took an assistant and several armed police soldiers dispatched by the Ministry of Police and hurried to Xianghe City to report to Li Mingyuan in person.

(End of this chapter)