Brother Zhu Youxiao

Chapter 311 Controlling locusts and adding fire

March is the time for spring plowing. When the north is experiencing drought, other provinces such as Liaodong, Hexi, Shandong, and several southern provinces are still peaceful.

"Folks, please pay attention. From this year onwards, the price of harvesting grain in Huangzhuang will be [-] Wen per stone for sweet potatoes, [-] Wen for potatoes, [-] Wen for wheat, and [-] Wen for rice!"

On a field ridge in Fengyang Prefecture, Nanzhili, when a villager was shouting, the people who were planting rice in the field looked up at him.

It was only after he finished speaking that the people below whispered:
"Mother, the food price has finally been raised."

"This imperial court calls for planting sweet potatoes every day. In the early years, eight stone sweet potatoes could only be sold for [-] renminbi. Now they have finally raised the price."

"I wouldn't have grown sweet potatoes if it wasn't for the military farm."

"This year is not bad. Eight stone sweet potatoes can be sold for [-] coins. My family has five acres of sweet potato fields and two acres of potato fields. I think they can be sold to the imperial court for [-] coins."

"The imperial court raised the price of sweet potatoes and potatoes. Should we just plant sweet potatoes and potatoes next year? I'm too tired to grow rice..."

Huangzhuang harvested grain, which was a policy formulated by Zhu Youjian after the Tianxia army abolished the fields and distributed the fields to the people.

He is very clear that it is unrealistic to blindly ask the people to grow potatoes and sweet potatoes, and the atmosphere in Beizhili has not spread so quickly to the whole of Ming Dynasty.

Therefore, it is necessary to find a place for the people to sell grain, and this place is Huangzhuang, which has lost even one mu of land under its name.

Right now, Huangzhuang has become an institution specializing in harvesting sweet potatoes and potatoes. Since the situation in the past few years was not too bad, sweet potatoes and potatoes are easy to grow, and the management cost is low.

Therefore, the purchase price of sweet potatoes and potatoes sold by Huangzhuang to the people is not high, and the economic benefits of one mu of land are slightly lower than those of wheat and rice.

But from this year onwards, the atmosphere began to change.

Huangzhuang raised the purchase price of sweet potatoes and potatoes this time. In the area south of the Yellow River, the economic benefits of one mu of land, potatoes and sweet potatoes are equal to that of rice and wheat.

Once the price of potatoes and sweet potatoes, which are easy to manage, equals the price of rice, some people who dislike the bitterness of growing rice will inevitably expand their planting of potatoes and sweet potatoes.

Although this has increased the cost of harvesting grain in a disguised way, it has increased Daming's grain production.

However, it is impossible to grow sweet potatoes and potatoes blindly for a simple reason...

The storage time of these two is not as good as that of rice and wheat. Even in a particularly good environment, the storage time of sweet potatoes is only half a year, and that of potatoes is about two months.

With such a short storage time, it is doomed that only places with convenient transportation are most suitable for the interests of the Ming Dynasty.

Therefore, when the villagers knew about it, he added:

"The imperial court has restrictions on the purchase of potatoes and sweet potatoes from all counties. The upper limit in our Xincheng Village is [-] mu, so those who want to plant them should go to my house to discuss after dinner."

After finishing speaking, the villager turned around and left, leaving the common people looking at each other in blank dismay.

Such a scene happened in various places in the Ming Dynasty, but Zhu Youjian in the capital was very satisfied with his policies.

"According to your Highness, there is a limit of [-] million mu in South Zhili, and [-] million mu in other southern provinces such as Sichuan. There is no limit in Shaanxi, Shandong, Liaodong, Shanxi, Hexi, Henan, and North Zhili. The Old Port does not participate in the…”

On the eighth day of March, in the study of King Qi's Mansion, when Bi Ziyan from the household department sat on a chair and had a long conversation with Zhu Youjian, Zhu Youjian also looked at the document in his hand and nodded.

There are no restrictions in the north, Beijing and six provinces, and there are restrictions in the south, Beijing and Jiugang. The old port only collects rice...

That is to say, Huangzhuang's restriction on sweet potatoes and potatoes in the south is [-] million mu, while the no restriction in the north will completely increase the proportion of the national grain output of sweet potatoes and potatoes.

The reason why Zhu Youjian imposed restrictions on the southern provinces is very simple. If all the [-] million mu are used to plant sweet potatoes, the output of sweet potatoes will reach [-] million shi.

Calculated at one hundred coins per stone, the imperial court needed to pay ten million taels of silver to buy them.

The storage time of sweet potatoes is doomed, and most of the sweet potatoes in the southern provinces of Beijing and Jiuzhou cannot be used as relief for the disaster-stricken areas in the north.

They will be used as fodder and wine making, and secondly, they will be used as disaster relief food for temporary relief of local disaster victims.

If [-] million stone sweet potatoes are used to make wine, sweet potatoes can produce about a quarter of the weight of wine.

In these days, Zhu Youjian probably figured out the price of civilian drinks in Daming, which is roughly twelve cents a catty of wine.

Sun Yuanhua has already led people to make wine and gave Zhu Youjian an answer. The wine produced by [-] million stone sweet potatoes is [-] billion catties.

If it is sold at ten cents per catty, excluding labor and shipping costs, the Liquor Department's liquor tax revenue for civilian drinks alone will be around [-] million taels.

Of course, three billion catties of wine, unless the people of Ming Dynasty drink them as water, they won't be able to consume so much at all.

But one thing to forget, the severe drought will be accompanied by a wide variety of diseases.

To deal with them, the amount of alcohol needed is also extremely terrifying, and in foreign wars, the high-concentration alcohol used to treat the wounded is also in great demand.

Therefore, the imperial court needs spare alcohol, so the amount of alcohol entering the market is about [-] billion catties.

In addition, Zhu Youjian also lowered the price of drinks to an extremely low price that had never been seen in the Ming Dynasty.

To put it bluntly, it is the same as the method he used to crack down on illegal salt. He only sells eight coins when the wine in the market sells for twelve cents.

It will not be too late to raise the price after hitting the bootleg alcohol on the market.

Even if it is reduced to Bawen, [-] billion catties of wine, excluding labor and freight, can still sell more than [-] million taels of wine tax revenue, which exceeds the annual income of [-] million taels during the Tianxi period of the Song Dynasty.

"The number of imperial stores needs to be expanded. Every market town and countryside in my Ming Dynasty needs a medium-sized or small imperial store. In the county town, there should be one in each of the four cities in the east, west, north, and south."

Zhu Youjian turned his head to look at Wang Chengen who was standing in the corner, and Wang Chengen also responded:

"The construction of the imperial store is not a problem, but according to your Highness's request, one person in each store in a village, five in one store in a market town, and forty people in four stores in a county town..."

Wang Chengen paused for a moment, and then said with a look of embarrassment: "The prefectures, county government offices, market towns and villages of the Ming Dynasty needed [-] imperial workers."

"In this way, the wages of the hired workers alone may reach three million taels of silver..."

The wages of the hired workers in the imperial store are divided according to the size of the city, which Zhu Youjian has already formulated.

In big cities such as Beijing, Suzhou, Hangzhou, and Chengdu, the price is [-] Wen per person per day and [-] Wen per month.

The next best places, such as Jinan, Luoyang, Xi'an, etc., are [-] Wen per person per day, and [-] Wen per month.

Once again, the first class is [-] Wen a day, [-] Wen a month, and the last one is a small imperial shop in the countryside, a fixed [-] Wen per person a month.

The [-] hired workers cost three million taels of silver, which is comparable to the salaries of more than [-] officials in the Ming Dynasty.

However, the Huangdian must exist, because whether it is briquettes, salt, tea, or various commodities that will appear in the future, as well as the upcoming sweet potato wine, they will all be sold by the Huangdian.

The expenditure of the imperial store is large, but the silver that can be earned is also enough.

Adding up all the items, it is normal for the Huangdian to earn more than [-] million taels of silver every year. The annual income of an organization is enough to compare with the treasury income of a Ming Dynasty during the Wanli period.

The more than three million taels of silver will eventually be returned to the Huangdian in the form of trade.

"As long as the tax revenue from the Imperial Store, the Shibo Department and the Ministry of Households can pay the salaries of the officials and the army, the rest of the land tax can be used for disaster relief..."

"Don't be reluctant to spend three million taels of silver, thank you." Zhu Youjian gave an order, and when the money was mentioned, Bi Ziyan also said:

"If this wine department wants to digest the tens of millions of sweet potatoes, at least one winery needs to be built in each province."

"There is a liquor store in each prefecture, which produces roughly [-] to [-] catties of wine every year. This requires at least [-] helpers, nearly [-] people..."

"The treatment at the wine shop can't be too bad..." Zhu Youjian said after hearing this:

"Add [-]% to the wages of wine making apprentices and masters in the market."

After Zhu Youjian finished speaking, the scribes lined up in two rows at the door of the study began to fiddle with the abacus. After a while, one person came in and said:

"After the increase of [-]%, the apprentice will have one tael a month, and the master will have three taels and three taels. The [-] government needs to invest [-] taels of silver to build a factory, and the annual expenditure is more than [-] taels. silver."

"The investment is not very large, so it's no wonder that the Song Dynasty is so obsessed with the wine tax." Zhu Youjian spoke to Bi Ziyan after hearing the words, and then said:
"In this winery, [-] million stones of sweet potatoes are put into wine making, and more than [-] million stones of wine dregs will be left."

"These wine dregs are made into feed afterwards and sold to the common people at the price of a bag of [-] catties and a bag of ten coins in the imperial store."

One hundred catties of wine dregs only cost ten coins, which is a very cheap price, and it is also a kind of subsidy for benefiting the people after drinking.

In this way, as the imperial court gradually obtained various daily necessities such as salt, wine and tea, Huangdian also became another form of supply and marketing cooperative in disguise.

"The construction of the liquor store needs to be accelerated. After the establishment of the wine department in October, it is necessary to start cracking down on bootlegging. Before the end of the twelfth lunar month, it is necessary to ensure that the wine department is profitable."

Zhu Youjian was explaining to Bi Ziyan, and Bi Ziyan also nodded to express that he would care.

But while paying attention, Bi Ziyan had a strange expression on his face, he hesitated to speak.

"What's the matter?" Zhu Youjian noticed Bi Ziyan's awkwardness and began to ask, and Bi Ziyan said:
"There is a severe drought in the north, and there is another war in the southwest, plus the repair of the Yellow River, the treasury has been overdrawn..."

Bi Ziyan did not mention the war of sweeping captives in every sentence, but he mentioned the war of sweeping captives every sentence.

Zhu Youjian heard this clearly, and Zhu Youjian also frowned and said:

"The war against captives is imminent. If the severe drought spreads to a greater extent, our dynasty will fall into the quagmire of drought and disaster relief."

"Jianlu is currently slaughtering the Han people looted under the rule, and there are not a few acres of land reclaimed, and it has stabilized for the time being."

"If they are allowed to recuperate, they will recover from their injuries in the Battle of Restoring Liao in a few years."

"At that time, our court will be busy with internal governance, and we can only maintain a large number of troops to defend Liaodong."

"What's more, the three prefectures of Taining, Yidonghe City and other places are not protected by the Great Wall, and Jianlu horse infantry come and go like the wind."

"Instead of spending more than three million taels of military pay for the Eastern Army's governor's mansion every year to defend, it would be better to spend [-] million taels of silver in one go to wipe out Jianlu."

"As for the matter of money, I will give the feudal vassals time to think about the return of the sailing fleet tomorrow, and then discuss matters to enrich the treasury. You don't have to worry."

"That being said, but..." Bi Ziyan was still a little worried, and he said after a while:

"In the past, there must have been locust plagues after severe droughts. Your Highness must remember the locust plagues that occurred during the severe drought in Shandong."

"Are you afraid of a plague of locusts?" Zhu Youjian frowned slightly after being reminded.

If there is really a plague of locusts, then the war against captives may really have to be postponed.

"This year's severe drought has affected the four provinces. If there is a locust plague, I am afraid that the food in Henan, Shandong, Hexi and other places will be difficult to preserve..."

Bi Ziyan said worriedly, and this also made Zhu Youjian's face uncertain.

He is well aware of the power of the locust plague. If there is another locust plague this year, it can be said that Shandong has not been stable for seven years since the first year of the apocalypse.

Shaanxi has not been stable for three consecutive years...

"In your opinion, how to control locusts?"

Zhu Youjian asked Bi Ziyan, there is no way, the scale of locust plagues in later generations, there is no way to compare with the scale of locust plagues in this era.

The method of controlling locusts that he knew in later generations is completely unworkable in this era.

Later generations will control locusts from a biological point of view.

For example, an important factor in the survival rate of insects is fungi, and generally speaking, there are a lot of fungi in the soil.

Together with various pathogens, they can infect insects with many diseases, so that only 1%-5% of a batch of locust eggs can survive to the next breeding season.

The fungus has an obvious suppression effect on locusts, but it has a fatal flaw, that is, it is afraid of heat.

To what extent are fungi afraid of heat?Human body temperature is sufficient to kill most fungi, which is why fungal diseases are so rare in humans.

Therefore, fungal diseases, such as athlete's foot, can only be infected at the lower end of the body.

During drought, the soil on the surface cracks, and the sunlight directly shines into the cracks in the ground, killing a large number of fungi, which is equivalent to directly disinfecting the whole body of locust eggs, which improves the hatching rate of locust eggs.

The policy of locust control in later generations started from this direction.

In the past, when locust plagues occurred, people only thought of using chemical agents to kill them, or using the natural enemies of chickens and ducks to restrain them. However, this year's locust plagues have been eliminated, but large-scale locust plagues will still break out in the future.

So what later generations did was basically to prevent problems before they happened, so that the locust eggs could not hatch, so that they could not harm the crops.

To do this, we need to protect the fungi. To protect the fungi, we need to create an environment conducive to the growth of the fungi, that is, to shift the focus of work from killing locusts to protecting the ecological environment.

The simplest method is to build dams where they occur, control the water level, and let the locusts have nowhere to lay eggs.

Then cultivate the lake and beach wasteland, protect the local vegetation and land, and let the fungi produced in the natural environment replace humans to deal with locusts.

After these efforts are carried out, although there will still be some locust plagues in various places, it is basically difficult for large-scale transfer of locusts to occur again, and the previous large locust plagues and famines are gone forever.

But the problem is that what Zhu Youjian has to face now is the most extensive drought in five thousand years.

From the Zhengdan Festival to the present, it is still spring, the creeks in various provinces have dried up, and the silt in the dikes has dried up...

Under such circumstances, how can he control locusts?It is nothing more than relying on the means of the ancients.

Facing his inquiry, Bi Ziyan actually had a hard time.

Ancient methods cannot effectively prevent locust plagues, so he can only bite the bullet and say:

"Prevention is difficult to do. We can only use bonfires to trap and kill locusts after they are formed, dig trenches to trap them, and use equipment to hunt them down, or drive the people to dig out locust eggs and drive them away with sound and color."

"In addition, it is necessary to order hunters not to kill beneficial birds to protect locust-eating birds, raise locust-eating poultry, and prevent and control viruses."

"In particular, it is necessary to "prohibit the capture of robins", and give rewards according to the "people catch locusts for a bucket, and give Su Beizhi" during the Hongwu period."

Bi Ziyan mentioned most of the locust control methods he could name, but having said that, these methods can only control the scale of the locusts, and cannot completely eliminate the locusts.

When dealing with large-scale attacks by locusts, these methods still seem powerless...

It's just that there are not many ways to do it right now, Zhu Youjian can only support his forehead and say:
"Issue these policies first, and besides..."

Zhu Youjian thought for a while, but couldn't think of any good way for a while, and finally he could only sigh.

"Encourage the cultivation of sweet potatoes and potatoes in the six northern provinces of Beijing. No matter how severe the locust plague is, it is impossible to get into the soil and eat all the sweet potatoes, right?"

Zhu Youjian made the worst plan, that is, after the locust plague broke out, nearly [-] million people in six provinces in Beijing and Beijing had to eat sweet potatoes and potatoes for several months, waiting for the rice harvest in the south to be transported north.

"The Battle of Sweeping Captives..."

Zhu Youjian thought for a while, and finally could only frown and said: "For now..."

He said this with some unwillingness and helplessness. After all, if Jianlu could be defeated, hundreds of thousands of soldiers and horses from the Eastern Army's Governor's Mansion would be liberated.

Where will these soldiers go?Needless to say, they will go to Japan to completely solve the border troubles of the Central Plains Dynasty for nearly a thousand years.

As long as they are dealt with and the steam engine is built, then Daming can go north to North America.

Not to mention that after solving them, the silver mines in Iwami and other places can increase Daming's income by millions of taels of silver every year.

Thinking of this, Zhu Youjian felt a little uncomfortable.

Even though he has carried out various reforms at the risk of going too far, the Ming Dynasty has long-standing problems, and it cannot be solved by a single strong medicine. Even he, under the general trend, seems particularly insignificant.

"Your Highness..."

While Zhu Youjian and Bi Ziyan were struggling with how to control the locusts, Lu Wenzhao walked into the study, and recovered his expression after seeing Bi Ziyan and Wang Chengen in astonishment for a while, Jishou said:
"News came from Nanchang that Cao Bingbi had ordered the Military Armament Institute to distribute [-] hydraulic looms, build factories in Nanzhili, Zhejiang, Fujian, Jiangxi and other places, and recruit [-] female workers The rest..."

"Cao Bingbi ordered people to announce the good news to His Royal Highness. This year's looms should be able to produce [-] million pieces of looms, and asked whether to reduce the price of weaving in the Huangdian."

"What is the price of weaving in Huangdian?" Zhu Youjian rarely heard good news, and turned to look at Wang Chengen.

"A piece of cloth is [-] cash, and the price of selling it to the Europa merchant is [-] cash." Wang Chengen replied honestly, while Zhu Youjian thought for a moment after hearing the words, and then said:

"The price of white cloth in the two capitals and sixteen provinces of the Ming Dynasty has been reduced to [-] yuan a piece, and the price sold to Europa merchants remains unchanged."

To be more lenient than the people and stricter than the barbarians is the basic principle of Zhu Youjian's actions.

Even if the white cloth is [-] Wen, merchants from various countries in Europe will still continue to fight for it. After all, it will still make twice the profit if it is sold in Europe.

If it weren't for the need to maintain the enthusiasm of the Europa merchants, Zhu Youjian might have raised the price of white cloth.

Now Europa is in the midst of the Thirty Years War, and the economies of all countries have been smashed to pieces. It is better to maintain stability for Europa businessmen first.

If the Thirty Years' War in Europe ended early, it would be much easier to start raising tariffs and commodity prices at that time.

Thinking about it this way, Zhu Youjian is wondering whether to take the opportunity to intervene in the Thirty Years War.

Of course, he would not sell armaments and artillery to the Europeans. After all, Ming was not yet at the level of a generation ahead of Europe in technology.

However, Ming can still do this by selling some things to make the Thirty Years War in Europe more intense, and finally let all countries end the war early due to casualties.

As for what to sell?This is of course gunpowder...

Because the Central Plains has been frequently bullied by Western forces with firearms since modern times, many people have a wrong idea, that is, our Central Plains dynasty clicked the wrong technology tree, and used all the technology for making gunpowder to produce firecrackers.

However, in fact, the development of gunpowder and firearms in the Central Plains Dynasty was synchronized, but the development of firearms was not as fast as that in the West.

In this kind of development, although the power of firearms is not as good as that of the West, the number of firearms of the Central Plains Dynasty can crush the West.

For example, during the Qianlong period, the Qing army spent more than [-] million catties of gunpowder to attack Jinchuan and Jinchuan, and almost used up the amount of gunpowder used by the United States in the eight years of the War of Independence in almost one year.

The reason for the small amount of gunpowder is that gunpowder in the West is too expensive, and like Daming, setting off fireworks during festivals and festivals is undoubtedly a luxury for Europeans.

The amount of gunpowder used by the people of Ming Dynasty to set off firecrackers during Chinese New Year is enough to start a war in Europe that lasted for several years.

Take the consumption of fireworks and gunpowder during the Zhengdan Festival just after seven years of the Apocalypse as an example. According to the cost of gunpowder in Europe, the gunpowder consumed by the Ming people on the Zhengdan Festival night can be sold for hundreds of thousands of taels of gold in Europe.

Although Zhu Youjian doesn't know the price of gunpowder in Europe, how can someone know...

Thinking about it, he ordered Lu Wenzhao: "Order someone to find the missionaries of Ming Dynasty in the past two years, and ask them about the prices of gunpowder in various countries in Europe."

"In addition, let Sun Liang of the Ordnance Bureau start to build a branch of the Gunpowder Bureau in Palembang Province, with an annual output of two million catties of gunpowder."

"Wait to ask everything clearly, and tell Shen Tingyang that the Imperial Store of Xiaoxiyang Supervision Department is responsible for selling gunpowder at half the price of Europa gunpowder."

After giving the order, Zhu Youjian narrowed his eyes:
"Two million catties of gunpowder, I want to see how much money I can sell..."

(End of this chapter)