1988: Back to the human world for a few years

Chapter 370 Detour
"When talking about DZ's light industry, we cannot avoid mentioning Dezhou's textiles, especially the cotton textile industry... Although the cotton textile industry's industrial chain is not the longest, it has the widest impact among light industries;"

"Based on the feasibility analysis of the city's textile export expansion, Texas' cotton textile industry has great potential."

"First, 1978 to 1989 was the eleven years with the fastest growth in textile and clothing export trade since the founding of the People's Republic of my country."

"During this period, the total value of textile exports increased from US$24.3 billion to US$131.1 billion, with an average annual growth rate of 16.6%, exceeding the national average annual growth rate of 16.5% for foreign trade exports during the same period. The total value of textile exports ranked first in the country, accounting for nearly 1/4 of the country's total exports."

"Although the total export value of textiles in DZ City last year decreased compared with the previous year, it still maintained a scale of 2.7 million US dollars, ranking first among all light industrial fields."

"In addition, in the domestic textile market, Dezhou's cotton textile exports also occupy an important position, exported to more than 100 countries, and supply a large amount of cotton textile raw materials to 11 other provinces. It is one of the top ten cotton textile raw material supply cities in China."

"In general, my country has become the world's largest textile producer. Although the textile industry has become a sunset industry in the process of world industrial transformation, due to its high employment rate, low capital investment and quick results, the textile industry's position as a major foreign exchange earner in our city during the Seventh Five-Year Plan period is unshakable."

Taking a deep breath, Xiang Hui continued, "Of course, after research, we found that there are still many problems if our city's cotton textile exports are to continue to expand."

"First, because a large number of cotton supply quotas were outsourced to other provinces and sister cities, DZ City was short of textile raw materials and lacked development momentum."

"During the Seventh Five-Year Plan period, the main reason for the rapid growth of Texas' textile exports was that it relied on cheap domestic raw materials and labor, and relied on low-cost competition based on volume to squeeze out the international market and obtain foreign exchange."

"Due to the substantial growth in export volume, the gap between supply and demand of textile fiber raw materials in DZ has reached 1985 tons since 2.6. As the fiber supply is insufficient to meet the export demand, the actual per capita consumption of cotton fabrics in the local area is difficult to increase. At present, the contradiction between domestic and foreign sales caused by fiber shortage is becoming increasingly acute."

"In the next few years, if there is no major breakthrough in Texas' cotton production, there will be a lack of raw materials for the production capacity of 200 million spindles. The shortage of raw materials has become an important constraint on expanding exports."

“Second, local enterprises have outdated technical equipment, backward process levels and low labor productivity.”

"The aging of technical equipment in textile enterprises is an important factor restricting the quality and grade of textile products in this city."

"Take cotton spinning and dyeing as an example. Currently, 30% of the cotton spinning equipment in Dezhou is overdue for service. There are about 100 million spindles in the city, of which 30 are legacy equipment from before liberation."

"Not only is the overage rate of printing and dyeing equipment as high as 30%, but the equipment is basically configured for large-scale production, which makes it difficult to cope with small-scale, multi-variety and flexible production."

"In terms of technological level, only 0.71% of the new technologies and equipment in Dezhou's textile industry have reached international standards, only 5% have reached domestic advanced levels, and 94% are at average or outdated levels."

"At present, the world has more than 700 million spindles of [open-end spinning] and [shuttleless looms], which represent new textile technologies, accounting for more than 5% of the total number of cotton spinning spindles and more than 18% of the total production capacity. Among them, the total number of shuttleless looms has reached 50, accounting for more than 18% of the total number of cotton looms and nearly 45% of the total production capacity... In industrialized countries in Europe and the United States, this proportion is even greater."

"The proportion of air-spinning and shuttleless looms in our city currently accounts for only 1-1.5% of the total. From the perspective of the micro-operation mechanism of enterprises, most enterprises generally lack the ability and enthusiasm to accumulate funds for technological transformation. Therefore, it is impossible to make up the gap with the world's advanced regions in the short term."

“正是由于技术设备及工艺水平落后的制约，DZ市纺织业的货币劳动生产率只及美国、日本的1/9~1/8；实物生产率只及美国的1/4，日本的1/3；印染业只及美国的1/10，日本的1/3。”

“Third, the products are of low grade, poor quality, and a large proportion of primary products.”

"In the past few years, the growth of textile exports has mainly relied on the large-scale export of resource-based primary products, [winning by quantity] and low wages and low costs, and the export products have low [technical content] and [artistic content]. In addition, the fiber supply is insufficient. The technical content of Dezhou's exported textiles has not increased with the expansion of exports, and sometimes it has even declined compared with the past. The product quality has not improved quickly. These factors have generally restricted the improvement of our city's ability to earn foreign exchange per ton of fiber. In 1989, although Dezhou's ability to earn foreign exchange per ton of fiber increased to US$5600, it is still only half of that of developed countries... If this continues, the export scale and income-earning capacity of DZ cotton textiles will only be further weakened."

At this point, Xiang Hui took a breath and said, "In short, after research and inference by experts in the city, starting from 1990, although the world textile market is unlikely to see double-digit trade growth like in the past 20 years, it will not be stagnant either."

"According to the growth trend of the world economy and population, the textile and clothing markets will become more active, the prices of cotton, wool and chemical fibers will remain strong, and yarn and cloth are in short supply. It is entirely possible that the growth rate of world textile and clothing trade will reach 6-7% in the next few years."

"That is to say, based on 1988 as the base, within five years, the world textile and clothing market trade volume may reach 2661-2842 billion US dollars... From a macro perspective, this is an opportunity for our DZ city."

"However, although the trend of expanding world textile market capacity provides a bright prospect for my country's textile exports, judging from the development trend of the textile trade war, it also increases the difficulty of further occupying the international market."

"First, the competition, restrictions and confrontation in the international textile market will only become more intense, and the tendency towards trade protectionism will become more serious."

"Second, in today's world textile trade war, non-price factors play an increasingly important role. Among the top 10 textile exporters, 6 are high-wage countries and 3 are medium-wage countries. Especially in the garment industry, high-wage countries have the initiative and relative advantages in world export trade. With several wage increases, DZ City's cheap labor advantage is gradually declining."

"In the context of the world textile market developing towards high-quality, high-end and high-value products, if DZ textiles still rely on primary products and low-value products and promote exports in quantity, DZ cotton textiles will lack the stamina for growth, whether from the perspective of the future development trend of intensified friction, competition and confrontation in the world textile trade market or from the current situation of intensified contradictions between local resource supply and local consumption."

"Therefore, considering the lack of local fiber resources, the increasing demand for fiber consumption, and the fact that the majority of international textile importers are developed countries, if DZ City wants to expand its textile exports in the next few years, it can only do so by improving the processing level, grade and quality of its export products, increasing its export foreign exchange earnings by increasing its foreign exchange earning capacity per ton of fiber, and avoiding the contradiction between exports and local consumption."

After outlining the general situation and problems faced by the cotton textile industry in DZ City, Xiang Hui looked at the people who had remained calm and finally got to the substantive content: "In this regard, the city's guidance is... to show courage, expand the supply of raw materials, adjust the product structure, and optimize the enterprise system reform!"

Show courage?

When everyone heard this, they immediately became serious. Everyone knew the meaning of these four words.

"Secretary Xiang, I want to know what the city's next plan is regarding the supply of raw materials?"

After getting Yang Mo's approval, Miss Mu was the first to raise her hand and ask a question.

According to traditional thinking, if we want to increase the supply of raw materials for cotton textiles, we must expand the cotton planting area.

But in the past year, Yang Mo not only invested in a large number of GAP medicinal material planting bases, but also Mo Mo Baichao's vegetable supply bases blossomed everywhere;
In addition, various projects derived from the commercial demonstration base also require a large amount of land production capacity... such as edible rose planting bases, peanut planting bases for supplying raw materials for purple candy, raw material planting bases for various medicinal teas, and so on.

It can be said that if the competent authorities of DZ City plan to drastically adjust the structural proportion of cash crops and significantly increase the planned cotton planting area, then a series of projects on Yang Mo's side will be seriously affected, and she will have no choice but to care.

Xiang Hui smiled in understanding when he heard this: "The city has conducted a thorough study on this aspect, and even held several meetings for special discussions. The reason why the final plan has not been finalized so far is to take into account the considerations of various units... Dahua Company, as an important cooperative unit of DZ City, is naturally also under key consideration."

Resisting the surprise in his heart, Xiang Hui gave a clear hint and said, "In the beginning, the city does plan to significantly increase the cotton planting area in Yucheng, Xiajin and other places from next year to no less than 180 million mu, and the production capacity is expected to exceed 14 tons to cope with the outstanding contradiction of shortage of cotton textile raw materials in Dezhou;"

"But after entering April, the city has been constantly revising this figure, from 4 million mu to 180 million mu, and then from 160 million mu to 160 million mu. At last week's economic work conference, a proposal was made to revise it again, planning to reduce the cotton planting area to 145 million mu next year... Of course, this figure may still be revised before September."

At this point, Xiang Hui explained: "In Dezhou, in recent years, the planting of cash crops such as cotton has shown an increasingly obvious [double poverty characteristics]... That is, only poor areas are willing to plant on a large scale, and only poor households are willing to plant on a large scale."

Everyone nodded, knowing clearly what Xiang Hui had hidden.

Whether it is planting cotton, managing cotton, harvesting cotton or processing cotton, it is an extremely tiring task. Its degree of energy and effort is definitely among the top three among all agricultural products. If there is a better choice, farmers will definitely not be willing to grow this thing.

This is also the reason why cotton-producing areas will basically finalize next year's planting plan in the third quarter of this year and carry out organizational mobilization work in advance... There is no other way. Without leaving enough time for mobilization, next year's work cannot be carried out as planned.

Of course, the reason why Xiang Hui deliberately mentioned the four words "double poverty characteristics" was actually to tell Yang Mo that the city was constantly lowering the planning indicators out of consideration for Dahua Company... After all, most of the projects currently derived from Dahua Company through the commercial demonstration street are concentrated in poverty-stricken areas. Once the planned cotton planting area next year is too large, it will inevitably affect the smooth development of these projects.

This can certainly reflect the importance that the DZ city authorities attach to Dahua Company, but it also indirectly shows who actually holds the initiative in this matter... If the two sides work together, then the effect will naturally be 1+1>2; but if there is a real quarrel one day, the DZ city authorities don't have to do anything else. Once the planting area of ​​cotton, a strategically important economic crop, is expanded, the chain reaction will inevitably cause Dahua Company's projects to be in a mess.

Yang Mo just smiled at this, but didn't take it to heart. Dahua Company is not a private enterprise. The cooperation between the central government and local governments is a dynamic system. The various causal entanglements in the middle are not as simple as they seem on the surface. Therefore, the more this kind of seemingly straightforward clamping factor, the less you need to worry about it. At the moment, he just nodded slightly: "Secretary Xiang, so how does the city plan to coordinate the contradiction of cotton production capacity?"

This is the key point. No matter how big or small the step is, the established general direction cannot be changed. So how to solve this problem is the confidence that is truly valuable to Dahua Company... After all, the other party is Ye Tao's secretary, not the kind of young man who can't even tell the primary from the secondary. Since he brought up the cotton textile industry first, it must be directly related to the next step of work for both parties.

Hearing Yang Mo's question, Xiang Hui immediately returned to the point: "Regarding this issue, Executive Ye's idea is to emphasize the idea of ​​[demanding production capacity from technology] at the next expanded meeting."

"That is to say, under the premise of reducing the planting area, we will try our best to ensure the completion of the cotton production target of 14 tons next year!"

"This means we must effectively increase cotton yield per acre to achieve this goal."

"If we want to increase the per-acre yield of cotton, we must start with seeds, machinery, pesticides, fertilizers, and agricultural materials;"

"As for seeds, it's easy. The Provincial Academy of Agricultural Sciences and the city's scientific research institutions have been committed to improving cotton seeds in the past decade. Currently, there are three new varieties available: Zhongmian No. 12, Lumian No. 9, and Lumian No. 11. This year is the third time that these varieties have been planted on a small scale. After the yield assessment is completed, we can decide which one to use as the main variety... Since 1986, the wilt disease in cotton fields in Dezhou has become more and more serious. The city originally planned to stop planting Lumian No. 6 and replace it with a more disease-resistant and higher-yielding variety."

"As for the machinery, it's easy to say. For large fields, the city already has a tradition of combined harvesting. As for the scattered small fields in the counties, the city also intends to learn from the advanced experience of Linyi County's debt swap model and sell small cotton machinery to the villages in installments at a discount... This happens to relieve the operating pressure of various agricultural machinery factories."

"But fertilizers and agricultural materials must first upgrade their technology and increase their use... In the past few years, farmers' reluctance to increase farmland inputs is an important reason why cotton yields per mu have not increased."

"So, Executive Director Ye has an idea. Can we use the influence of the drilling company and Xialiu Marketing Agency in rural areas to persuade and mobilize those cotton farmers to increase their investment in new fertilizers, pesticides, mulch films, and irrigation equipment under the guidance of technicians?"

"After all, if we want to increase agricultural production, every link is crucial, and we can't be reluctant to invest... Unfortunately, this involves the investment of private funds, and most of the main cotton-growing areas are poor villages, and our staff cannot force them to increase investment."

At this point, Xiang Hui looked at Yang Mo seriously and said, "Boss Yang, the city attaches great importance to the increase in the production of raw materials for the cotton textile industry. For this reason, it proposed additional land fertility subsidies, new cotton planting subsidies, crop rotation subsidies, conservation tillage subsidies, and agricultural machinery subsidies at the meeting... In addition, it even proposed a policy of depreciating plastic film and replacing grain subsidies."

"So, once all these measures are passed at the meeting, there will be a policy basis for increasing cotton production, and the interests of cotton farmers will be effectively protected... The only thing missing is how to effectively encourage these cotton farmers to take the initiative to increase their field inputs!"

Everyone present immediately understood the elegant meaning of the song.

No wonder the secretary chose the cotton textile industry as the first topic in his report. This is the reason for all the fuss!
Executive Director Ye is indeed Executive Director Ye. The angle of approach for this work is... absolutely amazing!
Ok……

That's right. On the surface, the cotton textile industry has nothing to do with the Isolated Island No. 2 project that both parties need to work hard to promote. Moreover, Xiang Hui's words just now sounded like he hoped that Yang Mo would give full play to his grassroots influence in rural areas and increase the per-acre yield of cotton.

But don’t forget the other key point in Xiang Hui’s words just now… “increase field inputs.”

You have to know that after the 1980s, China's agriculture has gradually begun to transform into modern agriculture.

Modern agriculture is also called "petroleum agriculture".

Take cotton planting for example. Apart from the diesel and gasoline needed for agricultural machinery, ground film, irrigation pipes, water conservation facilities, fertilizers, and pesticides all rely on petroleum... or to be more precise, chemical products derived from petroleum.

Especially for pesticides and fertilizers, two agricultural inputs that are crucial to increasing production, the word "oil" cannot be avoided.

And the most subtle thing is...

DZ City is planning to completely replace cotton varieties. Different varieties of cotton have different planting points, so the appropriate fertilizers and pesticides cannot be the same as previous varieties, right?

Very good. Students who have some knowledge of this area will know that just this slight difference has largely bypassed some of the remaining problems.

In addition, DZ City needs the Drilling Company and Xialiu Marketing Agency to mobilize cotton farmers to increase field inputs to increase per-acre yields... So it's only natural that you give them some of the agricultural supplies pie, right?

Considering the nature of the drilling company as a central enterprise, it would not be excessive to reorganize several pesticide companies, fertilizer plants, and agricultural supply companies in this area to specifically deal with the material production in this area, right?
Not too much?
That's fine!
Relying on the basic base of millions of acres of cotton fields, after the business of these agricultural supply companies is smoothly developed, they will have some say in the relevant fields in Texas, right?

Now that they have a say, it's not surprising that they have some complaints about the raw materials purchased from upstream brother units in DZ City, right?

The purity of the raw materials does not meet the standards, the thickness and ductility of the plastic film do not meet the standards, the production capacity cannot meet the requirements, the price cost is too high... blah blah, you can't refute it, right?
Can't refute it?

That's fine!
If someone is not satisfied with your industrial supporting facilities and buys raw materials that meet various standards from Dongying or other places for processing and production, you can't have any complaints, right?
You have to understand that in an old industrial area like Texas, the thing they hate the most is that you buy things from outside when you already have them.

But it happens that the quality of your products is not as good as others and the price is more expensive than others. While you cannot blame others, you also give the city an excuse.

However, this excuse must be strong enough... At the very least, agricultural supplies alone are not enough for the city to break through layers of resistance and introduce a super-large petrochemical project like Isolated Island No. 2.

But as the saying goes, a stitch in time saves nine!
Work always has to be done bit by bit.

Besides, this is just the kinetic energy that the textile industry can accumulate. The light industry is not just the textile industry that is related to petrochemicals. There are many other places where kinetic energy can be accumulated!
Xiang Hui noticed everyone's reaction, then looked at Yang Mo who looked calm. After a slight pause, he suddenly added, "Of course, increasing cotton yield per mu is only one of the ways to make up for the raw material gap. Executive Ye once proposed at the meeting... If we want to give full play to the advantages of DZ City and improve our competitiveness in the textile industry, we also need to greatly increase the production capacity of high-quality man-made fibers!"

High-quality man-made fibers?
Miss Mu's face suddenly showed joy.

If this proposal can be implemented into a document, then the introduction of the Isolated Island No. 2 project will be halfway accomplished!

Her heart began to pound, and Miss Mu turned her gaze to Yang Mo.

At this moment, she really hoped that Yang Mo could help her find out how certain this matter was.

But Yang Mo just smiled slightly, as if he was quite satisfied with the information Xiang Hui added... but that was just satisfaction.

"Secretary Xiang, as far as I know, among the light industries in Texas, the toy industry has maintained a good compound growth rate in the past ten years... Although the export volume has been declining in the past four years, the OEM orders and component orders from domestic coastal cities have increased slightly... How about you tell us the city's guidance on future planning in this area?"

Toy?

Why did Mr. Yang bring the topic to such an inconspicuous industry?
Even if you change the topic to the food packaging industry, I can still understand it.

After looking at Yang Mo with some complexity, Xiang Hui nodded slightly: "Okay!"

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PS: Happy New Year’s Eve, give me your red envelope!

No red envelope?

Forget it, let’s go downstairs to set off the fireworks!
(End of this chapter)