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"Your Majesty, I went out for a tour and learned the truth about the world. Your Majesty, you know that many local officials are slack in their work and the suffering of the people is often ignored. I have seen many counties and prefectures, although they are peaceful on the surface, the people have sufferings."

"I believe that the most urgent task is to establish a strict performance evaluation system for officials. In the past, performance evaluations have mostly relied on traditional indicators, such as taxation and public security. These two are important, but it is far from enough to judge the merits and demerits of officials based solely on them. Your Majesty, local officials either over-exploit the people in order to increase tax revenue; or abuse the punishment in the name of maintaining public security, causing the people to suffer.

"Therefore, it is necessary to introduce a survey on the satisfaction of the people. Randomly select people's representatives from each county to evaluate the performance of local officials. The people are the foundation of the country, and the quality of their lives can best reflect the merits and demerits of officials. This result will serve as the key basis for the promotion, demotion, or reward and punishment of officials. Only in this way can officials be encouraged to truly pay attention to people's livelihood, dare not slack off, and do their best to govern, thereby improving administrative efficiency."

"At the same time, it is necessary to set up a special official training institution. Your Majesty, today's officials are either conservative or lack talent and knowledge, and often don't know what to do when faced with new policies. Regularly select officials with potential for training, covering administrative management, law, economy, etc. Administrative management can help officials understand how to effectively govern the local area, law can enable officials to enforce the law impartially, and economics can help officials develop local people's livelihood. Through training, their comprehensive quality and professional ability will be improved, and after the training, they will be assessed, and those with excellent results will be promoted first, so as to cultivate a team of high-quality officials for Daqin to ensure the prosperity of Daqin..."

Yi Huawei stood with his hands clasped, looked at Hu Hai who was sitting on the imperial throne and continued:
"For the newly incorporated territories such as the Western Qiang, the Eastern Hu, and the Xiongnu, a flexible local administrative system should be implemented according to their ethnic characteristics, geographical environment, and economic development. In areas where ethnic minorities live, the tribal management model can be appropriately retained, but officials from the Qin Empire must be sent to supervise and guide the implementation of the central government's orders."

"We will also strengthen exchanges between counties and establish a mutual assistance mechanism. Economically developed counties will provide counterpart support to less developed counties in terms of agricultural technology, handicraft production, commercial trade, etc., to promote balanced development of all regions..."

As Yi Huawei spoke at length, Hu Hai yawned repeatedly, but he had to force himself to stay alert and wait for Yi Huawei to get to the point.

Yi Huawei looked around at the ministers, then bowed to Hu Hai and said in a loud voice: "Your Majesty, since the eleventh year of the First Emperor, when he ordered General Wang to attack Yanyu, our Great Qin has been marching eastward every year, and it has been nearly forty years. There are wars every year, and the soldiers bravely kill the enemy, behead people and seize cities. There are many meritorious people, and they all need to be rewarded. In the Guanzhong area, the unowned fields were divided up several years ago, and even the forests and swamps in the corners were opened up to accommodate the nobles who moved from the Five Kingdoms. Since the war to destroy Wei, the fields rewarded to the soldiers in Guanzhong began to extend to the border counties."

Hu Hai frowned slightly, and the ministers were whispering to each other with different expressions.

Yi Huawei continued:
"The situation in Shandong counties is even worse. Yingchuan, Sanchuan, Hedong, Henei, Nanyang and other counties are already densely populated and have limited land. Now, soldiers from these places even have to open up new land from Taiyuan, Yanmen, Shanggu and other places."

Having said this, Yi Huawei paused for a moment and glanced at everyone. He saw some ministers nodding slightly, while others seemed to be thinking about something.

"There are 48 counties in the Qin Dynasty, each with a population of nearly one million, but the farmland is only a little over 10 million mu, and there is no surplus farmland any more."

As Yi Huawei spoke, he spread out his hands with a serious expression.

Hu Hai sat up straight, looked at Yi Huawei and asked, "What should we do now?"

There was a murmur of discussion among the ministers. Some noble ministers changed color slightly, but did not dare to say anything.

"Moreover, the military merit system of Qin State consumed Qin's own land when it annexed the six states, like a bottomless pit. Although new land was reclaimed every year, there were more new military merit landlords, and the demand far exceeded the supply. As a result, the Central Plains, which was already short of land, became even more stretched, and many counties even had no land to reward meritorious soldiers."

Yi Huawei shook his head and sighed:
"Trust is the foundation of a country. If the promised land cannot be delivered, the two foundations of a strong country, military merit and fame, will collapse. At present, there are three solutions."

"What can I do?"

Hu Hai leaned forward, and all the ministers pricked up their ears.

"First, we should increase the development of the inner counties. We should turn all the gardens, forests, mountain and swamp hunting grounds into arable land, and order meritorious soldiers to reclaim wasteland in their hometowns. Over the past ten years, His Majesty the First Emperor has also done so, repeatedly reiterating Shang Yang's order to reclaim grass and wasteland, and ordering all counties to continue to reclaim land. Unfortunately, most of the land reclaimed is concentrated in the plains, and a large amount of land in the mountains and forests cannot be used for the time being. We can only barely maintain the balance between supply and demand of farmland."

Hu Hai nodded, and some of the ministers echoed him.

"However, this situation has been completely broken with the victory of the Western Expedition. Not to mention that Li Xin and other generals have gained several hectares or even dozens of hectares of land. For the 300,000 people who participated in the war alone, if each person is awarded an average of one level of nobility, 30 million acres of land will be needed!"

Yi Huawei raised his voice and looked serious.

Hu Hai showed a look of shock, and all the ministers were also shocked.

"It is no longer sustainable to rely solely on land reclamation. In order to appease the meritorious soldiers, we have to find another way."

"The second method is to strike hard at the nobles and tycoons in the counties of the former Five Kingdoms, seize their land, and let the Qin army soldiers immigrate and occupy it. However, His Majesty the First Emperor has never done this before, and I dare not make any suggestion. Although His Majesty the First Emperor moved some of the nobles to Guanzhong for monitoring, he did not seize their land, but tacitly recognized the land ownership situation before the Qin army entered. He ordered the people in various places to report their own land to the county magistrate and the treasurer, and they would be self-employed. Except for the land of the nobles who resisted the army and was taken as public land, the rest of the people's land was not seized by the government..."

Hu Hai nodded slightly.

When the Qin Dynasty annexed the six kingdoms, if it took such action to seize the land in the old lands of the five kingdoms where conflicts were acute, it would be like adding fuel to the fire. Although the people could sit back and watch the country change and the kings fall, if their land was touched, they would regard the Qin Dynasty as an enemy. Even the honest farmers would carry their farm tools to resist.

"The third method is to expand the territory and open up new counties and new fields on the lands of the barbarians and barbarians as rewards for the soldiers..."

"Humph!"

A general snorted coldly: "How can the remote western region be compared with the Central Plains? This is not a reward, it is clearly a demotion!"

Other generals also echoed the sentiment, and the crowd was outraged.

Hu Hai frowned and fell into deep thought. The ministers were also talking about it, and the whole court was noisy.

"Ahem!" Yi Huawei coughed lightly, and the sound was particularly clear in the silent court. He slowly looked around, his eyes like torches. The ministers of His Highness were all in awe when his eyes swept over them, and they immediately shut up. The court was silent, leaving only the sound of everyone's breathing.

Yi Huawei stepped forward and said in a loud voice: "Have you ever thought that if the ancestors of the Great Qin had not worked tirelessly to cultivate the land in the west, that land would probably still be infested with barbarians. How hard was that? Our ancestors cultivated the wasteland with shovels and hoes and resisted the invasion of barbarians, which led to the stability of the Great Qin's western border today."

Yi Huawei paused for a moment and continued, "The ancestors of the Chu people were also like this. They worked hard and overcame all difficulties to bring vitality to the Jianghan area. When Wu Qi carried out reforms, the nobles of Chu moved to the border areas. Those nobles were unwilling to do so. When King Dao of Chu was alive, they were able to suppress him. After King Dao died, they rose up and attacked him. Although Wu Qi killed many nobles, the reform of Chu was aborted halfway. Those nobles who escaped the disaster happily ran back to Jiangling and continued their extravagant life. So, more than a hundred years later, the southern part of Chu is still so desolate and backward."

Yi Huawei frowned slightly: "Gentlemen, which era of change has no victims? If everyone is greedy for the stability of their hometown and is unwilling to go to the border to expand the territory, the territory of China today is probably still just a small piece of the Central Plains. How can we forget the efforts of our ancestors and give up expanding the territory of Daqin because of a moment of comfort?"

Hu Hai nodded slightly, as if he understood something. The ministers also fell into deep thought. Some military generals frowned, and some civil officials had flickering eyes. They were all weighing the pros and cons of Yi Huawei's words.

"In fact, according to the current situation, the problem with the farmland is not mainly about the acreage."

Yi Huawei bowed respectfully to Hu Hai, then turned to the ministers and said:

"We have introduced several new crops, potatoes, sweet potatoes and corn. These crops have been planted in some counties in the past year, and their yields are beyond imagination. Take potatoes for example, even if they are planted on relatively poor land, their yield per mu can reach dozens of stones, and the same is true for sweet potatoes and corn. If these crops are promoted, it will not be difficult to feed 300 million people based on the current arable land area. After a year of exploration, the planting method has gradually matured and the yield has stabilized. However, even if the grain output is expected to increase significantly, the crisis of our Qin has not been resolved. If we let it go, our Qin will be in danger of overthrowing."

"Lord Zhao is exaggerating!"

At this time, Yao Jia stepped forward and bowed to Yi Huawei before questioning, "Lord Zhao, since we have such a high-yield product that can feed more people, how can we talk about crisis? And the danger of overthrow? Now that our Great Qin has millions of soldiers, is there anyone in Yan who can rival our Great Qin?"

"A thousand-mile dam can be breached by a single ant hole. Although our Great Qin is now free from external enemies and our borders are peaceful, our internal troubles are like a ulcer attached to our bones, gnawing at the foundation of our Great Qin bit by bit."

Yi Huawei's mouth corners slightly raised, looking at Yao Jia, and said: "Lord Li, you don't know that although the fields have increased grain production, the problem of land annexation has become more serious. At present, there are about 300 million mu of arable land in the country and a population of about 30 million. It seems that the standard of five people per household and one hundred mu per household is sufficient. But in fact, a large amount of land is concentrated in the hands of a few nobles and meritorious officials."

As he spoke, Yi Huawei picked up a piece of silk and unfolded it to read: "According to reports from various places, land annexation is particularly serious in Guanzhong. Many noble families have fields stretching across the country, while ordinary people only have a small amount of land, or even no land to cultivate. Take the area near Chang'an as an example. A noble family occupies thousands of acres of land, while the surrounding farmers, several families, only have one acre of thin land."

There was a murmur among the ministers, some of them looked embarrassed, while others looked worried.

Yi Huawei continued, "The situation in Shandong counties is not optimistic either. Yingchuan, Sanchuan, Hedong and other places are densely populated and land is already in short supply. The local powerful families have used various means to annex land, and many people have lost their livelihoods and become refugees. If these refugees cannot be properly resettled, they will become a hidden danger for our Great Qin."

Hu Hai frowned and asked, "Then how do you think we can solve this problem?"

Yi Huawei said: "Your Majesty, first of all, the cultivation of new crops should be vigorously promoted throughout the country. The court can send experienced farmers to various places to guide the people to grow potatoes, sweet potatoes and corn. At the same time, certain rewards should be given to the people who grow these crops, such as tax reduction and exemption."

"Secondly, the issue of land annexation must be rectified. The court can order a re-measurement of the land and check the ownership of land in various places. For those nobles and ministers who illegally annexed a large amount of land, they should be punished according to the law and their excess land should be confiscated."

As soon as Yi Huawei finished speaking, the court was in an uproar.

A nobleman's face flushed red. He took a few steps forward and said with strong resentment, "Your Excellency Prime Minister, this is wrong! The land of our family was obtained by our ancestors who followed the previous king in battles and were rewarded for their merits. How can it be illegal? By doing this, you are making an enemy of us and putting the Qin Dynasty in a position of disloyalty and injustice!"

Several nobles nearby also echoed: "Exactly! We nobles have served the country, but now our land is being investigated. How can this be justified?"

"If the imperial court treats meritorious officials like this, who will be willing to serve the Qin Dynasty in the future?"

Nei Shiteng stood up and said, "You are wrong, my lords. Nowadays, land annexation is serious and the people are displaced. This has become a major problem for the Qin Dynasty. If it is not rectified, the people will suffer and the country will no longer exist. Lord Zhao's proposal is for the long-term benefit of the Qin Dynasty."

"Humph!"

An aristocrat who was born as a military commander glared at Nei Shiteng and said, "What do you know? We nobles have shed blood and sweat for the Qin Dynasty, so what if we occupy more land? Those lowly people were born to serve us. They have no land because they are incompetent!"

As soon as these words came out, there was an uproar in the court. Many ministers with conscience were angry, but they were afraid of the power of this military commander and dared not speak out.

At this time, Li Si slowly spoke: "Lord Zhao, I understand the harm of land annexation, but your method is too radical. Re-measure the land and check the ownership. This project is huge and very likely to cause unrest. If it is not handled properly, it may cause civil unrest."

"Your Majesty, the land law should still be the well-field system. This way, there will be no such thing as land annexation, and it is the most effective way to curb the major clans."

At this moment, a Confucian scholar stood up and made some shameless suggestions to Hu Hai.

As soon as the doctor finished speaking, the entire Xianyang Palace was in an uproar again.

Yi Huawei was in a high position and had great power, and his authority was growing day by day. That's why this group of nobles tried to reason with him in a nice way, hoping that he would retract his idea.

How dare a Confucian scholar speak so recklessly? !
(End of this chapter)