New Shun 1730

Under the strange silence, some of these private salt dealers couldn't stand it anymore, so they made up their minds and said that it would be no big deal if they died!

"Duke, we are not bragging. We are capable, but those who sell official salt are incapable. This is called occupying the toilet without doing shit. We have occupied such a good position in vain, but can't do anything. If they are capable, we can't sell it to Xinyang, let alone Xiangyang."

Liu Yu laughed and said, "Nonsense, if you sell official salt, it's the same. It's a cage. No matter how capable you are outside, you will become a turtle inside. This is the problem of the cage. Do you really think you have the ability to turn the world upside down?"

After speaking, he coughed lightly and called someone. An attendant came in with a pen and paper from outside, sat on the stool below, and hung his wrist, waiting for the shorthand of the interrogation.

After a short communication, Liu Yu began to ask these private salt dealers some key and gradually serious questions.

Starting from the route of private salt transportation, to the sales amount of each county, the staff, transportation costs, and the additional costs of bribery.

Then to where the private salt was transported from, where the owner of the salt well was from, Sichuan's salt industry policy, etc., gradually deepened.

Different perspectives, looking at the same problem, will have completely different feelings.

From the confessions of these private salt dealers, Liu Yu saw the war history of the Dashun Dynasty for a hundred years.

From the tug-of-war in Sichuan starting in the Jiashen year, to the counterattack, and then to the recovery of lost territory and returning to the old capital.

Then began the Northern Expedition, began to use troops against Mongolia and Liaodong, and then Shaanxi and Shanxi merchants began to rise because of assisting military supplies and logistics.

Then, the north was gradually pacified, and a large number of Shaanxi merchants had experience in doing big business and dealing with government officials, and also had experience in running salt in Huai to support military supplies.

At the same time, because of the war, Shaanxi merchants enriched a lot of capital.

With the end of the Dashun Northern War, Shaanxi merchants, carrying a large amount of capital accumulated during the war, and the relationship with the government in the previous decades of purchasing military supplies, as well as the advantages of salt transportation, crossed the Qinling Mountains and entered Sichuan.

The salt fields in Sichuan were all small handicrafts with insufficient capital.

In addition, without the training of Lianghuai salt industry and military supplies, they were somewhat slow to respond to the court's policies.

The merchants in Shaanxi seized the opportunity, quickly rose, and successfully monopolized the salt industry in Sichuan.

A new model was formed, which Liu Yu saw as vibrant.

The land of Sichuan gentry, the capital of Shaanxi, the labor of Sichuan, and the silver currency of Jiangnan were successfully integrated here, bursting out a huge capitalist vitality that was as vigorous as the British wool that made landlords and capitalists twist together.

The gentry who owned land in Sichuan were happy for Shaanxi big merchants to bring capital to invest, because it meant that their rent would increase.

Some people rented land to Shaanxi capital for a long time and signed contracts for many years.

Some people cleverly chose to "use land as equity", but also took some "silver pledged".

The so-called "silver pledged" is a one-time income, which is pledged to Sichuan landlords by Shaanxi capital before renting land, to ensure that they will not go bankrupt during the lease period. If they go bankrupt, the money will be directly given to the landlords.

Rather than saying that this is a business gap between Sichuan and Shaanxi, it is better to say that it is a business gap between Sichuan and Jiangnan.

Because at this time, everyone knows that "Shu people are not familiar with salt business, but only know how to produce salt; Qin people are more familiar with salt industry than Jiangnan, and their capital is thicker."

They are also losers in the competition with Hui merchants in Lianghuai area, and they came here to win over the original small handicraftsmen and local business groups.

And this is actually a special hidden fiscal transfer of Dashun.

To dig a good salt well, if you want to ensure sufficient natural gas and abundant brine, the cost may be up to 30,000 to 40,000 taels of silver.

A well several hundred meters deep is not a capital that ordinary practitioners can afford.

And where did the capital of these merchants in Shaanxi come from?

Earned from the battlefield in the north.

Where did the money spent on the battlefield in the north come from?

The court collected it from Jiangnan.

It should be said that war and grain transport were the few means of state intervention, regulation and fiscal transfer in Dashun.

It was just that with the end of the war in the north, Liu Yu was forced to find other ways to transfer Dashun's capital to remote areas.

There were two reasons why Liu Yu asked Shi Shi to travel thousands of miles to catch private salt dealers.

The first was that Xinyang and other places were remote areas in the Huaibei Salt District, which were most likely to be blocked by Huainan salt merchants.

Liu Yu was not worried about the surrounding areas of the Huaibei Salt District. There would be no fools who would guard the salt field and collect unlimited salt when blocking salt. That was not because the family was rich, but because the family had a Potos Silver Mountain.

This kind of remote area was the main battlefield where "war" might occur, and he needed some "elite" private salt dealers to be "thugs".

The second was how to view the reform of Dashun this time.

In Liu Yu's view, this was just patching up.

He had long thought that Dashun would be finished sooner or later, and that it was useless to fix it.

All he did was to dig a grave for Dashun.

However, when digging the grave, he had to consider making Dashun, the old mother body, healthier and the new era stronger, so as not to cause a double death.

The new era can only be nurtured in the body of the old era, there is no doubt about that.

So what does Liu Yu think of the salt administration reform plan mentioned in the court this time? Basically, I think it's nonsense.

If you want to change it, just move the Lianghuai salt area.

Because the canal is abolished, the salt areas of Shanxi, Shandong, and Changlu need to be redefined.

And... repairing the Huaihe River water conservancy and other issues.

In fact, the salt reform that Liu Yu wants is to let the Lianghuai salt area directly abandon Hubei and Hunan and give all to Sichuan salt.

Anyway, it's better to move the Lianghuai salt merchants at once.

Canal transportation, salt workers... these are not the economic pillars of northern Jiangsu in Liu Yu's plan.

He wants to directly abolish the entire canal economic belt, from Huai'an to Yangzhou, and destroy it all.

Northern Jiangsu should still be the raw material production area of ​​southern Jiangsu, grow cotton and grain, and be the economic vassal and "cheap labor provider" of southern Jiangsu.

There are several reasons for this consideration.

He is not very interested in whether Sichuan salt or Lianghuai salt is better.

But he knew that the model of Sichuan salt wells required thousands or tens of thousands of taels of silver to develop a new well, which was a natural capital-intensive industry.

This also meant that steam engines could be used in the salt well area.

At least, it could replace the horse-drawn capstan. The local area already had supporting tools, and the steam engine was just a power source to replace the horse's power.

Taking advantage of this wave of selling Hubei and Hunan to Sichuan salt to ensure a large amount of capital investment, the steam engine was launched.

Who said that the use of steam engines must focus on the textile industry first?

At the same time, salt well technology can be used for inefficient oil production, which is beyond doubt. Since wells of hundreds of meters can be drilled, with the accumulation of technology, Shaanxi's oil fields can also be developed - the development of the glass manufacturing industry and the development of the whale and marine animal fat industry, as well as the labor-intensive lighting needs of the salt well area, have made the extension of oil on the agenda. Throw away all gasoline and diesel, and the most valuable oil now is kerosene.

This means that Liu Yu, through his position and influence in the feudal dynasty, cut off the meat of Lianghuai and created an opportunity for Sichuan salt to create a market in the two lakes out of thin air, so that part of the new investment can directly apply steam engines.

As for southern Jiangsu and northern Huaibei.

In Liu Yu's view, the canal was abandoned. In fact, the decline of Huai'an, a city ranked in the top eight in the country at that time, was inevitable. It is estimated that after the canal was abandoned for twenty years, not to mention the top eight, it is estimated that the top eighteen will not be seen.

At the same time, the Huaihe River entered the sea and the irrigation area was reorganized...

And the most important point is that the canal was abandoned, and the unspoken rule of protecting the north but not the south was cancelled. Dashun already had the prerequisite to solve the flood in Lianghuai after the Yellow River burst, regardless of it, and let it flow northward.

Some minor problems, such as the canal drainage and flushing fields in the rainy season; the canal water blocking and prohibiting irrigation in dry days, were solved with the rise of sea transportation.

In other words, the agricultural conditions in northern Jiangsu will soon improve.

Huainan uses the salt boiling method, and needs a large amount of forest land to provide firewood, all of which can be reclaimed as land.

The Huaihe River flows into the sea, and the irrigation area of ​​the Huaihe River is directly repaired, so that the conditions of the irrigation area of ​​the Huaihe River are completely suitable for the development of agriculture.

There are many suitable cotton-producing areas in China, but many of them are theoretical and have no meaning for the development of the light industrial revolution in southern Jiangsu.

For example, the Western Regions are really a good place to grow cotton, but what's the use of it now?

Shandong and Henan are also top-quality cotton-producing areas.

But the problem is that it is the main grain-producing area in the north of Dashun. How can it encourage cotton planting under the huge population pressure?

The Northeast is sparsely populated, but cotton cannot be grown there.

Northern Jiangsu does not have this problem.

After the Yellow River flowed south in the Song Dynasty, the northern Jiangsu region has always been a famine area, and it needs exemption, relief, and grain relief almost every few years.

This "broken place" at this time, the "poor northern Jiangsu" that was reluctant to exchange a county in Henan for salt, the court did not consider the concerns of food security at all.

Liu Yu wants to say: In order to develop industry, let Henan grow cotton.

It is estimated that people will be criticized to death, from the emperor to the censors, this is a way to die.

But let's say that cotton can be grown in northern Jiangsu.

As long as the cotton in northern Jiangsu can be exchanged for rice in Southeast Asia, the court will agree with great enthusiasm, thinking that it will not have to provide relief of 200,000 or 300,000 taels every year.

Moreover, the special situation in northern Jiangsu makes it the only place in the capital area of ​​Dashun that is suitable for large-scale capital investment in land operations if the reform continues.

Three reasons.

First, because Huainan needs to boil salt.

Therefore, large tracts of land covered with grass and trees, especially some wastelands, are strictly controlled by the court.

Reclamation is prohibited.

The purpose is to use Huainan to boil salt as fuel.

Liu Yu's two-pronged strategy is to directly turn these lands into reclaimable land.

Sichuan Salt grabbed the two lakes area and made Huainan Salt decline. This was one move; the other move was to promote the sun-drying salt method. The sun-drying salt method can be used with salt tickets, but it is not easy to use with salt permits. The system reform is a software update to prepare for the hardware update. This is the peculiarity of Dashun. It is very difficult to do hard first and soft later.

With these two moves, even if the Huainan salt area is not abandoned, a large number of grasslands and forest areas will have little meaning.

They can all be reclaimed.

Second, the small farming area and the large-scale land reclamation area with capital investment do not overlap and do not affect each other.

Many wastelands can only be profitable with large-scale capital investment.

If small farmers do it, they will have to abandon it and run away in three years.

For example, cotton can be grown on these tidal flats and saline-alkali lands. However, this is not the way for small farmers to grow cotton.

To grow one acre of cotton, one acre of grass, one acre of rotational ploughing, and one acre of land-cultivating land are needed.

For example, cotton is grown on land A, and grass is grown on land B. The grass from land B is used to cover land A to prevent the sun from evaporating water and causing salinization.

Land C is used to grow alfalfa, broad beans, golden cauliflower, etc., and should not be left empty to prevent the land from salting back.

For land D, grass is prepared to cover the cotton field in the second year.

This is the old experience in the Huaibei area, but it is obviously not something that small farmers can handle.

If small farmers want to grow it, it will take at most three years for the land to become salinized and lose its fertility, and nothing will grow.

Capital investment is different. Labor is cheap, and land is cheap, but it is all wasteland. Southern Jiangsu is about to usher in a new peak of foreign exports. It is a time when cotton is urgently needed. How can it not make money?

Third, it is the use of steam engines.

Water conservancy facilities also need power to lift water.

Large-scale farmland gives owners the motivation and capital to improve.

Even if it is to dig canals, it is impossible for small farmers to dig canals. Either it belongs to collective ownership or to capital ownership.

With the collapse of the salt industry and canal industry in northern Jiangsu, a large number of unemployed people can provide cheap labor.

If you don't want to go to the plantations in Southeast Asia, then stay in northern Jiangsu to pick cotton, or go to Songjiang Prefecture to work in factories as a contract worker until you die.

Therefore, Liu Yu's idea of ​​this salt industry reform is very different from others.

For example, the problem of "Sichuan salt invading Chu" that the court is always worried about, others always think about how to stop it, Liu Yu's idea is to directly assign Chu to Sichuan, collect salt taxes in Yangzhou, and collect salt taxes in Kuizhou, the old revolutionary base of Dashun in another time and space. What is the difference?

Let Chu belong to Sichuan salt, then there is no word "invasion"? Similar to the idea that if you don't pay, it won't be considered a sale. Isn't this a problem solved?

Originally, the two lakes had to be assigned to the Huai River and the Huai River because the canal and the salt industry were important to the finances of Dashun.

Now that the canal has been replaced by sea transportation and emergency finances have been replaced by foreign trade, why must Xiang and Chu be assigned to the Huai River and the Huai River? Isn't this a standard thinking of cutting the boat to find the sword?

Let the salt cooked by burning firewood in Huainan go upstream to Wuhan; to compete with the salt cooked by natural gas and Sichuan salt that flows downstream. Where does the confidence come from?

The prerequisite material basis for this confidence is a ship that can transport goods against the current and wind while emitting black smoke. But obviously, there is no such thing now.

As long as there is no such thing that can go upstream with black smoke, it is obvious that it will not be able to compete even if the salt tax is not collected.

With the end of the war between Dashun and Junggar and the completion of the border survey with Russia, it is inevitable that Shaanxi capital will enter Sichuan. Jiangnan cannot compete with Hui merchants, so should it invest in planting trees in Shaanxi? Where to go if not Sichuan? At this time, we should give a push, not push back.