Baidu otaku as Chongzhen

Chapter 103 Xu Guangqi ([-])
Xu Guangqi left.

Yang Reform sat on the chair alone, silent.

No one disturbed the whole room, and the atmosphere was very depressing.

Sun Chengzong and Xu Guangqi, who I rely on as my right-hand men, are too old, almost 70 years old.In the past, Sun Chengzong helped himself train the new army all day long. He seemed to be in good health, but he didn't think he was an old man who was almost 70 years old. Today, Xu Guangqi was drowsy in front of him, although he was tired from the long distance. , However, this also shows that my arms and age are already too big. Where are the young pillars of the new generation?Who is it?One person, no matter what, can't afford the whole country!

Yang Reform suddenly felt a little scared.

I am afraid that time goes too fast and people get old too easily.

I am afraid that as time goes by, as a historical prophet who travels through the sharp weapon, I will change too much because of my influence on history. At that time, I will not have this sharp weapon that can predict the future, and I will not have an arm worth relying on. What should I do?
……

March nineteen.

Early in the morning, Yang Reform was going to talk about the promotion of the drought-resistant crop sweet potato. Seeing a group of bureaucrats chattering endlessly over a trivial matter, he was really not interested in the discussion. From Yang Reform's point of view, they were just a group of Irrigation, Xiaobai of the crooked building, is not of much help to the things to be done. If I propose to promote sweet potatoes, I don't know where they will take the building crookedly.

Morning ended in a hurry.

"Big Companion, invite several masters, cabinet ministers, and ministers from various ministries to the Wenhua Palace. I have something to discuss." Yang Reform decided to narrow the scope of the discussion.

"Yes, Your Majesty."

……

Wenhua Hall.

Soon a dozen people gathered, including Sun Chengzong, Xu Guangqi, several cabinet ministers, and ministers from various ministries.They are the pillars of the Ming Dynasty.

Yang Reform sat on the dragon chair with a solemn expression.

The matter of promoting sweet potatoes made Yang Reform his brain, and his mind is still in a mess, with no good ideas.Yesterday I dreamed back to Baidu, searched once, and found that sweet potatoes were indeed promoted on a large scale in the late Ming Dynasty, but the effect was not very good.

The specific reason, Yang Reform himself concluded, is that the emperor's imperial decree cannot match the laws of the economy.If you can't make money, why should others grow sweet potatoes?

See everyone is here.

Only then did Emperor Chongzhen Yang Reform speak: "Yesterday, Master Xu and I discussed the matter of promoting sweet potatoes. All of you have a discussion, share your views, and see if you have any ideas to promote this sweet potato."

A minister came out and said: "Your Majesty, dare to ask what is a sweet potato? What is its use? Why should it be promoted?"

Yang Reform was depressed, he was only thinking about promoting sweet potatoes, and now there are still some ministers in the court who don't know, it's too late to convey this information.

"Master Xu, please explain to you gentlemen what sweet potatoes are."

"Yes, Your Majesty." Xu Guangqi agreed, then turned around and explained to the ministers what sweet potatoes are.

……

Xu Guangqi quickly told the ministers what is called sweet potato and why it should be promoted.

"Your Majesty, I believe that since this sweet potato can resist drought, does not compete for land, and has a high yield, it is really the only magic weapon against natural disasters. It should be promoted." After Xu Guangqi explained what sweet potato is, some people came out to agree. .

"Report to Your Majesty, the minister also agrees, this is a great blessing, and a blessing to my Ming Dynasty!" Another minister also agreed.

……

Seeing someone started it, the others also agreed, thinking, this is not a big deal!A small promotion of a crop is worth discussing with so many of our ministers here?
Chongzhen Yang Reform sat on the dragon chair, his brows were still furrowed, and he said: "Master Xu, I will introduce the difficult matter of promotion to all the Qing family."

Everyone knows that the promotion of sweet potatoes is a good thing, and it can fight against natural disasters, but no one thought that if you issued an imperial edict to promote it, would someone carry it out?This food is two taels of silver and one stone, how much is your sweet potato for one stone?Even the imperial decree is no match for the strong economic laws!

"Yes, Your Majesty."

"It is true that the promotion of sweet potatoes is beneficial to the country and the people, but unfortunately, this promotion is a problem. The price of grain is two taels of silver for one stone. In the north, one mu of good land can also produce one or two stones, which is three or four taels. For silver, even if the yield of sweet potatoes is relatively high, if the yield per mu reaches four or five shi, it may not be able to sell for two taels of silver. Planting some in the field is nothing more than large-scale planting, and if large-scale planting is not possible, how can we fight against natural disasters?..." Xu Guangqi slowly explained the difficulty of popularizing sweet potatoes.

"Your Majesty, what's the difficulty? As long as His Majesty issues an imperial decree to show that this kind of sweet potato has a high yield and can resist natural disasters, the people of the world will be willing to switch to sweet potatoes. Because, in the event of a famine, only this sweet potato can fill the stomach. , I think the people in the world will understand this truth." The minister saw the problem very simply, thinking that the imperial decree was a panacea, and that the people of the world would obey the imperial decree, but he never thought that this imperial decree came out of the Forbidden City. How effective.

Chongzhen Emperor Yang Reform sat on the dragon chair with no expression on his face, and said, "Master Xu, please explain." Yang Reform was too lazy to speak, and directly pushed the question to Xu Guangqi for explanation.

"As you order, Your Majesty." Xu Guangqi said.

"Most of the land in the world is concentrated in the hands of officials and landlords. Even if it is a natural disaster, it will have little impact on them, and they will not be hungry.... Landlords are after profit, so how can they actively grow sweet potatoes that are not as valuable as food?" What? Ordinary people have to pay taxes and land rent. The price of grain is high, so they must grow grain first. Otherwise, they will not be able to pay taxes and land rent. How about growing sweet potatoes?" Xu Guangqi explained very straightforwardly.Everyone’s family is a landlord, and land rent has always been a major income of the landlords. If farming does not make money, who will farm?For what to fight against natural disasters and drought?Natural disasters and droughts have always only affected ordinary people, and landlords generally have a certain immunity to natural disasters.It's not their turn to go hungry, so I'm not in the mood to grow worthless sweet potatoes with you to fight against natural disasters.

After Xu Guangqi said something, the ministers below stopped talking.

Everyone is a landlord, and everyone knows the tricky things here when someone else comes out.

In the family of officials, first of all, others do not pay taxes, and the purpose of farming is to earn money. If there is no money to earn, you say it’s heaven, and you don’t know how to grow sweet potatoes.Drought and no harvest, they will not go hungry. As for the food production will decrease, that’s okay. When there is a famine, the price of food will rise slowly. In normal years, it is only two taels of silver per stone. Once there is a famine, it will rise to five Six to two to go.Therefore, even if there is a famine and large-scale crop failure, it has little to do with them.They are also looking forward to a famine year in three to five years, so that they can sell the grain they have hoarded for many years at a high price.

Ordinary people have to pay taxes and land rent. Grain is valuable. Of course they grow grain. The landlord only collects grain, not sweet potatoes. If you plant so many sweet potatoes, others don’t accept them. How can you pay land rent?Pay taxes?When the time comes, he will end up in exile with his family broken up, who is to blame?The emperor is in the Forbidden City, but he can't control whether you are hungry or not.

Therefore, it is not so difficult to promote sweet potatoes on a large scale, and it is not so difficult to rely on sweet potatoes to survive the famine.At most, they are planted in the fields, in barren mountains and river beaches, and the scale is far from large. Without scale, it is impossible to talk about reserves and resistance to famine.

In the Wenhua Palace, there was another silence.

……

After a while, someone who probably thought of a countermeasure came out and said: "Your Majesty, I think that sweet potatoes can be listed as off-color and taxed. In this way, some people will definitely switch to planting sweet potatoes."

"Oh, tell me carefully."

"Your Majesty, I believe that if sweet potatoes are listed as a tax, it can be discounted. For example, two stones of sweet potatoes can be exchanged for one stone, or two and a half stones of sweet potatoes can be exchanged for one stone. In this way, sweet potatoes can be used to pay taxes. The people of the world, It will be planted on a large scale."

This is a bit interesting, and Yang Reform is also interested. If this happens, the number of sweet potatoes will definitely increase and form a scale.

"This policy is not acceptable, Your Majesty, I think it is easy to expropriate sweet potatoes, but how to store sweet potatoes? Is it not possible to distribute sweet potatoes to officials and soldiers?"

(End of this chapter)