Me! A high-ranking official!

At 10:00 a.m., Luo Jiaxin arrived at the village committee on time, got on his newly bought electric tricycle, tied a loudspeaker to the handlebars, and prepared to drive around the village calling out to collect garbage door-to-door.

Seeing this, Liu Zhijun was a little worried. Although Luo Jiaxin was hardworking, he was afraid that he wouldn't be able to figure out the classification standards or keep good accounts for a while. So he simply moved a few boxes of eggs and a few bags of salt into the back of the tricycle: "Jiaxin, I'll go with you! I'll keep an eye on things from the vehicle."

As soon as the two left, the exchange point at the entrance was empty. Zhao Jianguo had no choice but to put down his teacup and go out himself to sit behind the table and keep an eye on things.

Not long after, Old Heizi was seen walking over briskly, carrying two bulging garbage bags in his hands.

Seeing Zhao Jianguo sitting behind the table, Lao Heizi was taken aback for a moment, then chuckled and came over: "Hey, Secretary Zhao! Why are you personally overseeing things here? Yesterday the village loudspeaker announced garbage collection, and I was wondering if it was really true. Look, I've brought all the garbage I've stored at home!"

"Uncle Hei, of course it's true. Would the village committee fool the people?" He stood up with a smile. "Come on, let me see what treasures are here."

He didn't mind the dirt, put on gloves, took the garbage bag, and, imitating Liu Zhijun, deftly sorted the garbage while explaining the sorting rules to Lao Heizi.

Old Hei Zi watched as this dignified county secretary personally reached out to pick out rotten vegetable leaves, showing no airs of officialdom whatsoever. Listening to his explanation, he kept nodding in admiration.

Finally, Old Hei Zi couldn't help but give a thumbs up and laugh, "Secretary Zhao, I can see now, you're truly a good leader who gets things done for us ordinary people! Yesterday you not only swiftly resolved my family's difficulties, but today you've come up with this brilliant solution to our village's garbage problem!"

Old Hei Zi exclaimed, "You don't know, before, the village was always thinking of ways to collect our garbage collection fees. We villagers toil in the fields, earning money is already hard enough, and now we have to pay to throw away garbage! It's infuriating! Now it's great, you reuse this garbage, not only do we not have to pay, but we can also exchange it for firewood, rice, oil, and salt! Secretary Zhao, just for your cleverness and style, I, Old Hei Zi, admire you!"

While checking the scales, Zhao Jianguo replied with a smile, "Uncle Heizi, there's nothing absolutely useless in the world, only undiscovered treasures. We have no other choice but to do this. It's not easy for ordinary people to earn money, so every penny saved counts. Letting the environmental protection company do the cleaning is certainly easier, but if we pick out the valuable parts ourselves, we can reduce the village's economic losses. Although it takes a bit of effort from everyone, it's worth it to get tangible benefits!"

After saying that, he looked at the scale and wrote it down in the ledger: "Uncle, it's seven catties and six taels in total. Are you planning to save it and record it in the account, or do you want to exchange it for something now and take it with you?"

Old Heizi waved his hand generously and said, "Deposit it first! Put it in my account! We don't lack anything at home right now, let's save it up first, and then buy something bigger when we've received our share! Secretary Zhao, I have complete peace of mind putting my money in your environmental bank!"

Hearing this, Zhao Jianguo felt a warmth in his heart and smiled, assuring him, "Don't worry, Uncle! As long as I, Zhao Jianguo, am in this village, and as long as this bank can operate, this exchange point will continue to operate. I will absolutely not let the points that our fellow villagers have saved go to waste!"

"All done!" Old Hei Zi nodded admiringly, waved happily, and left.

Zhao Jianguo spent the entire day at the exchange point.

There weren't many people who came in the morning. They were mainly people who came out to check out the situation after hearing the loudspeaker, plus the ones that Luo Jiaxin and his team collected from the streets and alleys. In total, it was only about a hundred kilograms.

But by the afternoon, the situation was clearly different. The people who had traded for eggs and salt in the morning went home and spread the word that "garbage can really be used as money." The news spread like wildfire, and by the afternoon, there were significantly more people coming to the village committee with large and small bags.

In one day, they collected a total of over 300 kilograms of all kinds of garbage.

In the evening, Luo Jiaxin took a few trips to transport the sorted rotten vegetable leaves and kitchen waste to an open space outside the village using an electric tricycle. He then piled them up according to the method taught by Zhao Jianguo, preparing them for fermentation and composting.

Zhao Jianguo and Liu Zhijun sat at the table and discussed the day's accounts.

The more than 300 kilograms of garbage were exchanged for eggs, salt, soy sauce, and other supplies, which cost only about 40 or 50 yuan at most. But when the time came, the kitchen waste was fermented into farm fertilizer and sold to the orchard. In addition, the cardboard and plastic bottles that were sorted out were sold to the recycling station. Overall, they could get about 70 or 80 yuan back.

In other words, the environmental bank achieved a slight surplus on its first day of operation.

However, this surplus is clearly far from enough to pay Liu Zhijun and Luo Jiaxin's daily wages.

But this was entirely within Zhao Jianguo's expectations. Today was only the first day, and most of the villagers were still observing or simply didn't understand what was going on. Once it ran smoothly for a few days, and everyone saw with their own eyes that they could exchange real money for their garbage, and got used to garbage sorting, the amount collected would definitely increase exponentially. At that time, once the scale effect appeared, this business would naturally become self-sufficient, completely revitalizing the entire operation!

The next morning, Zhao Jianguo gave Liu Zhijun a few instructions about keeping an eye on the stalls at the Environmental Protection Bank, and then took a bus back to the county.

Although the surgery he had arranged with Zhou Qingyan was tonight, he specifically took the day off in advance. On the one hand, he wanted to go to the city in advance to scout out the location and make arrangements at the hospital. On the other hand, and more importantly, he wanted to take advantage of the half-day off to go back to the county and inquire about the 500,000 yuan road repair fund that had disappeared from Luojia Village.

However, he knew perfectly well that in the county, he was, to put it nicely, a mere writer, and to put it bluntly, an insignificant nobody. Using the county government office as a platform, he organized meetings and wrote documents, which did make him a familiar face to leaders of various bureaus and commissions; they would smile and nod when they saw him. But when it came to matters involving real money like 500,000 yuan, his connections alone were definitely not enough to get things done.

We need to find a big tree.

At 9:30 a.m., he walked into the large office area of ​​the county government office with familiarity.

"Oh! Isn't this our Director Zhao?" As soon as he entered, a sharp-eyed woman who used to work next to him spotted him and immediately teased him with a smile, "You've been promoted to be the first secretary stationed in a village, and you haven't even offered to treat us to a farewell dinner. You're getting more and more arrogant!"

Another young colleague chimed in, patting his chest with lingering fear, and chuckled, "Brother Jianguo, that false positive on your medical report really scared us all! We even had the money ready for our wedding gifts, but then you went off to work at the grassroots level, full of energy. What a scare!"

"My bad, my bad! I left in such a hurry, I didn't have time to make arrangements!" Zhao Jianguo greeted everyone with a smile, clasping his hands together and repeatedly begging for forgiveness. "I'm back today to apologize, everyone! Please don't leave at noon, I'll make the arrangements!"

Amidst laughter and cheerful chatter, he walked through the office area and arrived at the director's office, where he gently knocked on the door.

"Come in." Guo Huaixing's deep voice came from inside.