Haisheng Mingdi

Chapter 726
"Now the mainland is stable, the north has been recovered, and the number of refugees has decreased, and the number of immigrants to Taiwan has also begun to decrease. Now the immigrants to Taiwan are mainly landless poor in the mountainous areas of Fujian, Zhejiang, and Guangdong. However, the imperial court relocated them to Taiwan, and the cost is high. "

This year, Mao Xiang sent down the third rank to the fifth rank's Fu Sima, and actually worked as an errand for the county magistrate, but after letting go of the emotions in his heart and trying to calm down and do things, he gradually got on the road.

The four prefectures in Taiwan are all competing for immigrants. The first priority of all prefectural and county officials is immigration and investment promotion, especially immigration. All officials are required to recruit immigrants and include them in the assessment. Ask them to mobilize their family members, relatives, and friends to immigrate.

Nobody shuts everything down.

But immigration also has a cost. You have to go to the mainland to recruit people. The farther you go, the higher the cost. You have to pay for food on the road, as well as boat fare, and after you arrive, you have to pay for resettlement. Most of the new immigrants are poor and cannot directly settle down. However, these government-run villages have to recruit people, and they have to prepare cattle, seeds, and farm tools, and they have to repair water conservancy projects for land reclamation.

They even had to fight with the indigenous vassals of Taiwan.

It's all cost.

At the beginning, they directly recruited refugees from wars and famines. They were so hungry that they couldn’t survive. As long as they could have a stutter, they would be willing to send them to Nanyang as piggies, let alone Taiwan immigrants.After arriving in Taiwan, some rations were provided directly, and then collectively reclamation.

They are all tenants of government-run manors. The wasteland they reclaim is still owned by the government, and the grain they harvest can be collected for rent. This kind of immigration reclaims wasteland, and the government in Taiwan still makes money.

But the Central Plains is stable, and there is no source for this kind of free refugees, so they can only rob people from the Central Plains, and use horse racing to enclose land to attract the landless poor in the inland to enclose land and reclaim wasteland.

But it is becoming more and more difficult to recruit. You have to charter the boat fee, food and expenses on the way, and even resettlement after arriving in Taiwan.

Taiwan is now poor and white, and there are tax exemptions for land, etc., and the finances have no money. Although there is a special allocation from the central government for immigration, the amount is limited.

If you want to immigrate in large numbers, you have to find another way.

Maoxiang’s solution is that the government’s power is not enough, so use the power of the people, instead of looking for poor people to immigrate, now look for rich people to immigrate, and find those gentry, landlords, powerful merchants to immigrate.

Because they are powerful, they don't need the imperial court to bear the immigration costs, and the imperial court only needs to give policy conditions.For example, they were given more quotas for enclosing land, allowing them to enclose more land to reclaim wasteland, and even allowing gentry and merchants in the interior to form commercial villages and recruit tenants in the form of business names to reclaim wasteland.

Anyway, Taiwan is full of land now, and what is lacking is people.

Moreover, Taiwan's climate is very good, suitable for growing sugar cane, cotton, tobacco, etc. There are certain restrictions on the cultivation of cash crops in the mainland, so it is completely possible to attract businessmen to come and do business, without increasing the government's expenditure, it can attract people to cultivate and plant.

Plant these cotton, sugar cane, tobacco, etc., and then develop primary processing industries, such as sugar extraction, spinning, tobacco shreds, etc., and can also increase taxes.As for manpower, let them recruit tenants themselves, or directly buy slaves to run the farm.

Let's develop it first.

And if there are gentry and landlords in the Central Plains who are willing to come and immigrate for development, it will be even better. They have the strength to transport cattle, farm tools, seeds, and even buy slaves and tenants to reclaim more wasteland.

"There are only two things we need to do. One is to let go of policy restrictions, allow them to do business, and allow the people to reclaim more land. The second is to give tax relief, such as newly reclaimed land, and to give tax exemptions for more years. And More tax breaks should also be given to workshops such as sugar extraction and spinning.”

"Although tax revenue will be temporarily reduced, Taiwan still has to develop first. Once developed, it will not be too late to collect taxes."

Rice paddy fields can be self-sufficient and sold inland.As for other gardens, sugarcane, cotton, tobacco, tea, etc. can be grown without taking up valuable arable land in the Mainland, and can also promote the development of Taiwan.

Positioning Taiwan's agriculture as an inland source of raw materials can have a great cost advantage. Using the advantages of land and policies, we can develop large-scale economic manors, plant large tracts, and even use slaves and hired labor to increase production efficiency.

He also proposed Kaishan, which is to build three coherent east-west roads in the south, central and north of Taiwan, pass through the mountains, connect the east and west, and build post roads. It can be used to develop mines in the mountains, etc., and can also purchase deerskin, camphor, medicinal materials, wood, etc. from the aborigines.

Kaishan was implemented together with Fufan. Nowadays, many island clans, especially the Shengfan in the mountains, are very barbaric and very hostile to immigrants. There have been many attacks down the mountain.

Building three roads through the mountains will enable the Ming army to go deep into the mountains, divide them, trade traffic first, and then suppress and appease them. A fort town integrating a post station, a military fort, a market, and a fortress will be established in the mountain. It is necessary to set up schools, recruit the children of the Fan people, introduce them to the market, and so on.

It is not possible to simply conquer, encircle and suppress, the mountains are high and the forests are dense, and they can still be traded to attract them to communicate. As long as they are willing to communicate with the trade, they can be guided to cooperate with the Han people in mining, logging, etc.

Many mountain vassals are still accustomed to shooting and hunting for a living, with a small amount of planting, and each has its own hunting area passed down from generation to generation. In order to compete for hunting grounds, they often go out to hunt for heads. Without such a tradition, the conflicts will inevitably become more and more serious in the future, and the consequences and losses will be huge.

The imperial court can trade with them, bringing salt, iron, cloth, tobacco, grain, etc., in exchange for their minerals, wood, medicinal materials, etc., and they can also increase their income, benefiting both sides, and a win-win situation.

Mao Qizong sat by the fireside and carefully discussed his strategies for governing Taiwan with his son, filling in and modifying some details.

We chatted for a long time.

Mao Qizong looked at his son and felt very relieved. In the past, Mao Qizong was very romantic and impetuous. Although he felt that his talents were underappreciated, he could not do things in a down-to-earth manner.Even if the palm prints were all given to Shizhong before, it was even more so.Now that I have been to Taiwan for a year, my whole body has become darker and thinner, but I have also become more stable and down-to-earth.

He patted his son on the shoulder, "You are 38 years old, and you have finally matured and stabilized. You are doing well now. Just work hard in Taiwan for three years. It would be even better if you can try to be transferred to the prefect for another three years, young man. Don't be impatient, if you can stay there for six years, really do some real things, and make some real achievements in a government, that is the capital of your most precious political wealth, and you will never suffer of."

"Young people should pursue their careers, and the wind and snow will end up in an unrighteous way."

······
Zhu Yihai was very busy throughout the first month, and had to meet a large number of officials every day. Local governors, cloth officials, sub-inspectors, and prefects were all summoned together in batches.

I have to take time to see the envoys from all parties.

The generals in charge of the army were also summoned. Zhu Yihai, who was busy, got angry, his mouth was full of bubbles, and it hurt to drink water.

However, the queen was still vomiting with him, making it even more annoying.

Fortunately, Wen Anzhi, as the Chief Assistant and Chief Prime Minister, is indeed better than Song Zhipu in handling affairs, and he can handle many things in an orderly manner.

It wasn't until the eighth day that Zhu Yihai was free to summon a group of officials from Taiwan.

I listened to them give a detailed report, talking about the current development, as well as the various problems we are facing, financial problems, fan society problems and so on.

With the government's full support for the policy, Taiwan's development has actually been leaps and bounds. The total number of Han immigrants in Taiwan was only about 100 the year before, and this year it has just exceeded [-] million.

This is due to the various policy support of the imperial court, which encourages everyone to immigrate with their families, and even repays resettlement fees, allowing everyone to enclose land and reclaim wasteland, and provide various immigration loans.

Attracted many inland people, especially Fujian people, Fujian has many mountains and little land, which made Fujian people like to go out and wander. In the past, the sea was banned, and a large number of people went to Nanyang, and even went to smuggling and pirates. In the early years, Yan Siqi and Zheng Zhilong ran Taiwan. At that time, many people ran to cultivate wasteland.

But earlier, I just went to reclaim wasteland, when I was young and strong, I basically didn't bring my family.

But now the imperial court encourages direct immigrants to settle down, and even encourages Han immigrants to intermarry with familiar feudal vassals on the plains of the island. Even the slaves left by the Dutch before have given them freedom and household registration.

However, these local officials in Taiwan still feel that the population is too small. After all, there is a road with four prefectures below it.

But a prefecture only has about [-] people, which is actually the population of a county.

Now the imperial court's request is that a county can be added with a population of [-] households. They all hope to increase the population and add counties and townships.

Zhu Yihai felt that the strategies for governing Taiwan proposed by Mao Pijiang, such as immigration, investment promotion, mountain creation, and feudal lordship, were the most straightforward.

Now that the scale of immigration is slowly decreasing and the cost is increasing, it is indeed a good way to increase the number of commercial settlements.

"The imperial court can introduce policies to encourage commercial settlements, allow them to contract land in Taiwan to cultivate wasteland, allow them to grow sugar cane, cotton, tobacco, tea, mulberry leaves, etc., allow them to freely recruit hired workers or buy slaves for planting, and give tax and other benefits .”

Zhu Yihai did not directly allow land enclosure and commercial settlements as proposed by Maoxiang, but engaged in contracting operations like mining.

Merchants and people are allowed to reclaim land, but they need to obtain a contracting license. The lease can be renewed after five or ten years. However, the ownership of the reclaimed land is still state-owned, not directly reclaimed.

This is the difference from private reclamation. As long as the land reclaimed by the common people is within the limit, it is their own, and they can file the title deeds, and one can reclaim a hundred acres.

However, although there is no limit on the nature of commercial villages, commercial villages are in the nature of contracting and renting, and there is no ownership.But it can guarantee long-term leases, even excellent tenancy rights, with a term of five or even ten years, as long as the land is not barren, it will not be taken back.

Even the newly reclaimed commercial land can be reduced or exempted from the previous rent.

Doing this is also an insurance policy to prevent all the land in Taiwan from being encircled all at once, and immigrants will have no land in the future. If the tyrants enclose most of the land, there will be serious sequelae, so we can’t just focus on the immediate. You have to look long term.

The immigrants who came first were allowed to choose good land to reclaim wasteland, and they were given a high amount of land, one hundred acres, and even women and underage men could get a certain amount of land.

If they can manage to farm, then a family can occupy hundreds of mu of land and practice rotation farming. Although the yield of the newly reclaimed wasteland is low, it can still have a good output.

The later immigrants will definitely not have so much land to cultivate gradually, and they will not be able to occupy so much land if they have land, that is inevitable.

Just like in the hinterland, especially in places with sparse land and a lot of people, many people only have a few acres of land, and even most of them don't have an acre of their own land, so they can only become tenants of landlords.

Everyone has land, and everyone is a self-cultivator. This is basically impossible. In the end, it must be a pyramid structure. [-]-[-]% of the landlords own [-]% to [-]% of the land, and the remaining [-]% to [-]% of the people are all Can only be tenants of the landlord.

After the chaos, some land can be redistributed and some land mergers can be eased, but it is impossible to solve this problem.

When it was strong and prosperous, opening up, conquering new lands, immigrating and distributing land can also allow many people to obtain new land and become new landlords or self-cultivating farmers. The tenants were even wiped out.

Taiwan is suspended overseas, and there are many lands that can be developed and utilized. This treasure land is quite rare. There are not many such places, and even Taiwan has to face the threat of the indigenous people on the island.

Under the name of Zhu Yihai's Shaofu Supervisor, there is the Huangzhuang team that first went to the island to reclaim wasteland. Up to now, it has more than 5000 mu of rice fields in the Royal Manor, and more than 12 mu of sugar cane, cotton, and tobacco gardens.

Zhu Yihai's Royal Manor is the largest landowner on the island, and the plants are basically planted by slaves and hired workers. The slaves come from prisoners of war. Many were formerly recruited refugees.

The size of the Royal Manor is also related to his capital.From the very beginning, he devoted himself to developing with all his strength and invested in capital management.

The emperor did not keep many Huangzhuang in the Central Plains, and did not compete with the people for land. Instead, he invested heavily in Taiwan, a deserted island waiting to be developed, in order to take the lead. Although the cost was higher than that in the mainland, Zhu Yihai felt that Still worth it.

He has also sealed off a large amount of land in Taiwan in the past few years to the officials of the rank and file. Those who were awarded the title basically got an additional piece of land in Taiwan, ranging from hundreds to thousands of acres. These lands are all in Taiwan. The wasteland requires them to organize their own people to reclaim and plant it, and they also use them in disguise to develop treasure islands.

"Mao Bijiang's suggestion is very good,"

The emperor praised Maoxiang, and then proposed that the Royal Shaofu Supervisor will continue to take the lead in developing Taiwan next year, and will increase the development of Taiwan's minerals and timber.Today, many gold mines, copper mines and sulfur mines have been discovered in Taiwan, and they will be officially mined next year.

At the same time, new timber factories and shipyards will be built in Taiwan, and camphor processing workshops and deerskin processing workshops will be built there.

"Next year, the imperial court will station the Fujian Imperial Battalion in Taiwan, the Imperial Navy will also be stationed in Taiwan, the provincial patrol and garrison battalion will also be stationed in Taiwan, and a town will be set up, and their families will also be relocated. Register in Taiwan, you have to be prepared."

(End of this chapter)