My father Zhu Gaoxu

Chapter 383 Tianjin Kaihai
Zhu Zhanhe, who just got married, had to leave Beijing to go to Tianjin. Fortunately, it was relatively close, and if there was something urgent, he could ride back to Beijing in half a day on a fast horse.

Tianjin is going to open the sea, which is a matter of great significance, so Zhu Zhanhe did not dare to be careless. Before leaving, he personally went to the Sixth Ministry and asked them to mobilize a group of experienced officials to follow his arrangement.

Because the first thing to do when opening the sea is naturally to establish a customs, of course it can also be called the Shibo Department.

In fact, there used to be a city ship department in Ming Dynasty. When there was no sea ban, Guangzhou, Quanzhou and Ningbo each had a city ship department. To receive foreign envoys from various countries.

However, Zhu Zhanhe does not intend to use the name of the Shibosi, mainly because the rank of the Shibosi is too low, and generally belongs to the local chief envoy, and the chief envoy has the final say on taxation and the like. Power is too small.

Therefore, Zhu Zhanhe decided to use the name Customs, which is directly under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Households, not under the local management, so that the power of the Customs is also greater.

In general, the duties of the customs are nothing more than three. The first is definitely tax collection, the second is to inspect smuggling, and the third is to manage imported and exported goods and ships.

Therefore, in order to open the sea ban, the customs must be established first.

Therefore, after Zhu Zhanhe brought people to Tianjin, the first thing he did was to choose a location in Tianjin Port and establish Tianjin Customs.

The customs has one nominee, which Zhu Zhanhe temporarily serves as, and there are also two deputy nominees, as well as several officials under him.

At the same time as the customs was established, the news of Tianjin Kaihai finally spread.

For a while, the whole Tianjin Port was filled with excitement. Although Tianjin Port was lively before, all the official ships of Ming Dynasty came and went. Merchants who want to transport goods can only take official ships, and the official ships may not be free. Also pay heavy taxes.

For example, in the original sea transportation, every time after the grain was shipped, we would cooperate with the merchants to load some goods back.

But now it is different. Tianjin opens the sea and no longer enforces the sea ban. That is to say, private merchant ships can also come here to dock, and at the same time legally enter and exit the port.

Among the businessmen gathered in Tianjin, who doesn't know the convenience of sea transportation?Some people even set up fleets in private to engage in smuggling business.

For example, when Zhu Zhanhe was in the Japanese province, there were occasional fleets of merchants from the Ming Dynasty to trade in Anton Port, and these ships were actually smuggling ships.

In the past, these smuggling ships were not recognized by the imperial court, and even faced the suppression of the Daming Navy. Japanese pirates even regarded them as fat sheep. Therefore, although the profits of smuggling were huge, the risks were also extremely high.

But now that Tianjin is opening the sea, these smuggled ships can legally come to Tianjin Port for trading. As long as they are in the waters of Daming, they are all protected by the Daming Navy.

Therefore, as soon as the news came out, not only the businessmen in Tianjin were excited about it, but all the businessmen in the capital area who heard about it were all rejoiced, and then rushed to Tianjin as soon as possible.

Afterwards, all the shipbuilding workshops in Tianjin Port were overwhelmed, and everyone wanted to build their own fleet as soon as possible. After all, this was the first wave of bonuses. It is the benefit of real money.

Tianjin is a new port, and there are not many shipbuilding workshops, and they mainly build official ships, and at the same time provide some maintenance and other things for official ships. Therefore, these shipbuilding workshops cannot meet such a huge demand.

So some nimble minds immediately ran to other ports, waving money to pre-order ships.

And when the news of Tianjin's opening of the sea spread to the south, it caused an even greater sensation. After all, compared with the north, the south has greater interests in the sea.

Among other things, just following Zheng He's voyages to the West, the sea ban has also been loosened. There are not a few businessmen who quietly build ships and go to sea in private, and the shipbuilding industry along the Yangtze River is more developed.

Moreover, among these businessmen, there are quite a few well-informed people. They know that Zhu Zhanhe conquered Kyushu before and completely eliminated the pirate rebellion. This also means that the sea ban is meaningless.

The opening of the sea in Tianjin this time is definitely just the beginning, and it is likely to be the turn of the southern coastal ports to open the sea.

So these people also rushed to the major shipbuilding workshops to order ships first. Some smart businessmen even began to adjust their industries to prepare for the future.

It can be said that the opening of the sea has not yet officially started, and just some news has caused a commotion along the coast of Daming, and even caused some riots. After all, for the sake of profit, some businessmen will really fight.

However, these did not affect the overall situation. After Zhu Zhanhe established the customs, Tianjin also officially opened the sea.

The first batch of merchant ships to dock in Tianjin turned out to be from Japan and North Korea. They were former smuggling ships. These merchants from Ming Dynasty brought special products from North Korea and Japan and transported them to Tianjin Port for trading.

The customs officials have taken over the entire port, and there are special people to guide these ships into the port, and then the customs officials board the ships to check the goods, and then collect taxes according to the types of goods.

Of course, some of these goods that are not suitable for import will also be confiscated by the customs and destroyed on the spot.

With the arrival of the first batch of merchant ships, the customs began to officially perform their duties, and thus it was officially opened to sea.

In the following time, merchant ships from all over the world converged on Tianjin Port one after another, and goods from the north of the Ming Dynasty were also transported to Tianjin to go to sea through water and land transportation.

Daming’s opening of the sea has also affected some neighboring countries, such as North Korea, which was the first to receive the news. They are the closest to Tianjin. In the past, they could only trade goods with Daming through tribute, but now that Daming’s opening of the sea means that their merchant ships You can legally enter the port of Ming Dynasty.

So a month later, North Korean merchant ships arrived in Tianjin, followed by Japanese merchant ships. Although Ming Dynasty captured Japanese territory and the two countries were in a state of hostility, it did not affect the business of these merchants. In the past, merchants from Ming Dynasty also went to Japan to trade .

Only a few months later, Tianjin has become the economic and transportation center of the north. The prosperity of the port has surpassed that of the major ports in the south. After all, the ports in the south are not open to the sea, so naturally they cannot be compared with Tianjin.

Looking at the turbulent Tianjin Port, other ports of course couldn’t sit still, so officials from various ports also wrote letters, asking to follow the example of Tianjin Port to open the sea, especially Guangzhou, Quanzhou, and Ningbo. The long-standing port is now being compared to the new Tianjin Port, which makes them intolerable no matter what.

(End of this chapter)