Rise of the 1630s South America

Chapter 1829 Urbanization ([-])

On December 1680, 12, the sea and the sky were clear and blue.

The summer in Qingdao Port is always very pleasant, the temperature is not too hot, and the weather is also very sunny, which is suitable for people to travel and visit the countryside, especially when the population of this commercial city is increasing.

Urbanization, a word that originally only appeared in government policy research documents, is now increasingly familiar to a new generation of educated people on the east coast who have read books and attended school.

From a demographic point of view, urbanization is the process of mechanical concentration of the rural population into the cities. Of course, in this country on the east coast, there are still a large number of immigrants flowing into the cities, which cannot be ignored.

From the perspective of geography, urbanization is the process of transforming rural landscape into urban landscape, which not only includes the process of concentrating population and non-agricultural activities into cities of different sizes and the regional advancement process of transforming rural landscape into urban landscape, but also It includes the process of spreading urban culture, lifestyle and values ​​to the countryside. These two points are especially suitable for various situations on the east coast today.

Take Qingdao Port as an example. After rural handicraftsmen get rich, the first thing they do is to move to a place with convenient transportation in the suburbs, re-apply to build a few houses or buy ready-made houses as their new workshops.After all, most of the clients of many craftsmen live in cities, and they will naturally approach the market and the city.After 20 or 30 years in the suburbs where they live, new urban areas are often formed.From this point of view, when the city planners on the east coast built the first and second ring light rail railways for Qingdao County at one go, they really had the foresight to set up a large area of ​​land for the future development of the city in advance.

As for things like urban culture, lifestyles and values, the changes are naturally huge.Regardless of the cost and convenience of education for urban residents, the advanced level of living facilities, the amount of information received and disseminated, and the intensity of competition, the second generation will always make them different from residents in rural areas. , As the so-called culture and values ​​have mutated, discrimination is also faintly breeding.

In addition, from an economic point of view, urbanization refers to the process of transforming the rural economy into an urban economy, which mainly includes three levels of transformation: First, the industrial structure changes from the primary industry to the secondary and tertiary industries. The second is the transition of the labor force from the agricultural population to the non-agricultural population; the third is the transition from the rural consumption mode to the urban consumption mode.

In this regard, Qingdao County is actually even more typical. Over the past 50 years, the largest port city on the east coast has benefited from the rise of the east coast and the strong development of industry and commerce, and has made rapid progress.At present, the primary industry in the county has shrunk greatly, and the return rate of growing food is so low that more and more young people abandon their parents' traditional occupations and flock to the cities to work, and even try to go to the Pampa Plain The number of people who get rich and stick to farming is greatly reduced, and the overall age is also increasing year by year.Moreover, even the residents of Qingdao County who choose to continue to engage in agriculture prefer to form agricultural cooperatives one by one, with vegetables, fruits, flowers, gardens and special breeding as the main business methods. The market is aimed at urban residents. In fact, it can't be regarded as a traditional primary industry, because they basically don't produce food.

Now if you go to the wharf to see, from time to time there is a grain ship full of all kinds of food that sets sail from Hejian and Yazihu, and then arrives at the wharf of Qingdao Port to unload.In the inland area, through the Qingmei Railway and the Southwest Railway Branch Line (Jinjin Farm in Minghe County-Qingdao Port), a series of La Plata Star trains also loaded with corn, soybeans and wheat entered Qingdao Railway Station.Not to mention, in Patagonia, far in the south, almost every month, three or four ships loaded with cattle, sheep, salted fish, salt, dried fruits and wheat arrive at Qingdao Port—Qingdao County, a city with a high degree of urbanization It is so special that it attracts merchants, craftsmen and business owners from all over the world, and at the same time allows people from all over the country and even all over the world to bring goods for their consumption, and this is also the goal pursued by the people on the east coast: produce everything by themselves , You must monopolize any business by yourself. Not giving others a little money is the most stupid way. The trade balance under economic exploitation is the most perfect form. Otherwise, it would be interesting for you to be a gold and silver slave with a lot of money in your hand. what?No one serves you, no one works for you, what do you earn so much money for?

Mr. Cecil, the ambassador of the Kingdom of England to the east coast, just received a group of businessmen from England today.These merchants transported many heavy draft horses, high-quality white coal for military use, lead-zinc ore, and a small number of immigrants from Ireland entrusted by the Mendes Company to the people on the east coast from the old continent, saying that they were for the east coast. There is nothing wrong with serving the people, because at the trade level, the status of the British is obviously lower than that of the East Coast, and the dependence on the goods of the East Coast is becoming more and more serious.

Baron Cecil has lived on the east bank for almost seven years (he was transferred back to London for a period of time for some reason, and came to the east bank for the second time a few years ago to serve as the ambassador of England), and has a relatively deep understanding of the inside story of the east bank. I have also read a lot of newspapers and books on the east coast, so I am no stranger to the word urbanization.Especially after confirming the development history of London, a giant city with a population of more than 40, it is no exaggeration to say that his income even exceeds that of most scholars who study urbanization in government departments on the east coast.

Compared with cities on the east coast such as Qingdao County, the development of London is somewhat similar, but somewhat different.In this gigantic head of England, the modern industry recognized by people on the east coast has just started. Most of the enterprises are not large in scale. Labor-intensive small-scale production is the main body of the urban economy. Handicraft workshops, private small businesses and even households are the city main place of economic activity.The employed are mainly artisans, small traders, food wholesalers (retailers) and a small number of low-level service personnel.

At the same time, the agricultural economy occupies a relatively large proportion of the national economy (in other European countries, the proportion of the agricultural economy is much higher than that of England, and even occupies the dominant position), the efficiency of agricultural production is low, and the surplus of agricultural products is small—of course This is not true in London, but there are also huge agricultural production areas around London to provide food and other commodities for this 40 people.

High birth rate and high death rate lead to insufficient population growth, which in turn leads to insufficient "pull" of rural labor force outflow, and insufficient transfer of rural population to cities.At this point, Baron Cecil is particularly envious of the people on the east coast. Although they are pagans, they have to admit that their medical and health efforts are very effective and they are at the forefront of the world.Their government spends a lot of money every year to train doctors, nurses, pharmacists and other professionals, and to continuously build hospitals. At the same time, it also spends money that many people think is useless for disease promotion, using as simple and straightforward as possible Bai's language lets citizens know what many kinds of diseases are all about, and how to avoid and prevent them. This is very important for improving the overall sanitation environment of the city and reducing mortality.

Of course, since people on the east coast have done large-scale publicity on disease control among the people, it is naturally impossible to keep these things secret. Baron Cecil has naturally collected a lot of information in this regard over the years and has benefited a lot.And after he sent information about the causes, transmission routes, and how to prevent these diseases back to England, it did have a positive impact on the environmental sanitation of big cities like London.

But how to put it, maybe there is a problem with the financial system of the British government-it can be said to be in chaos. A few taxes such as customs duties go to the king, and others go to the government, but most of the taxes are temporary and seriously insufficient. Donations from businessmen are euphemistically called "aid funds"-almost no money is distributed to the sanitation environment.Baron Cecil was shocked by the messy layout, dirty environment and dense population of the London neighborhood, and at the same time was very disgusted. Sometimes he even wondered in his heart, who would set a big fire to destroy those messy places? Burn down all the filthy houses, and then the king ordered the re-planning of the streets, it must be better than now.He still remembered that more than ten years ago, St. Vedust and other parishes were hit by a fire, and many houses were burned down. Then, under the initiative of Mr. Morris Thompson, bricks and stones produced in the suburbs of London were used as the main materials for reconstruction. And re-planned the layout of streets, shipyards and some supporting workshops, and achieved excellent results.At present, the incidence of diseases in those parishes is the lowest, and the environment is the best, which can already explain the problem.

In addition, the fact that the English do not pay much attention to this is indeed one of the reasons.After all, unlike the East Coast, there are a large number of knowledgeable people to do propaganda in China. They don't know much about it, so how can they explain it to others?Even thinking about it is impossible.Therefore, it is actually not uncommon for a policy that was implemented well on the East Coast to be greatly reduced after going to the Old World.It's not that the English are not working hard enough, it's that the system is too far behind and there is no way.As the East Coast people themselves said, what they lead the most is not science and technology, but the system. From political system to economic system, social system, scientific system, education system and other aspects, the gap is all-round.

Sir Charles, the predecessor of Baron Cecil, including the principals of the Golden Deer Commercial House at the time, all attached great importance to the collection of the system on the East Bank, and once sorted out many of them and sent them back to London. After all, these are all public things. People from the East Coast Can't hide it.However, very few of the things sent back can be used. They are more of the king's criticism of his political system and the church's criticism of his religious system, although the members of Congress seem to respect his economic system very much.

Of course, the Kingdom of England did not fail to benefit from it. For example, they implemented the "Patent Law" strictly enforced on the east coast to protect the intellectual property rights of inventors. Although it is hard to say how well it is implemented, at least the attitude is expressed.In addition, as mentioned above, although the government is in financial difficulties and has a lot of holes, it still uses part of the money to improve the urban sanitation of London, employing hundreds of people to clean up garbage at night and transport it out of the city , and at the same time focus on training doctors.

The same is true for them in terms of science and technology. The government subsidizes gifted urban children (places are allocated according to the diocese) or seemingly important scientific and technological breakthroughs. Although the amount is not very large, it is better than nothing. It is beneficial to the development of science and technology in England. Definitely has a positive meaning.

But how to put it, the money is still too little!Even though there are some famous gentlemen who also donated funds and sponsors, compared with the funds allocated by the rich and powerful East Coast government, it is still pitifully small, which makes people feel discouraged when they think about it.Baron Cecil intends to continue to write a letter to the king after retiring from office and return to the country next year. At the same time, he will give a speech in Parliament, urging the royal family and Congress to allocate funds and reform their backward facilities-the first step is to start with London's environmental sanitation, which is very important to the government. Reducing the mortality rate of urban children is critical.

"Look at this street, this pier, and this bay. If my memory is correct, the amount of garbage floating near the Thames Estuary is dozens of times that in the bay on the east coast. The street is even more stinky, feces There are a lot of artisans living in low, damp houses made of rotten wood, full of rats and harmful bedbugs, processing goods day and night with dim old eyes. There are no beautiful brick houses, and there is no clean environment , there is no bright gas lamp, no well-planned streets, the urbanization of London, compared with the urbanization of people on the east coast, the gap is really too big, just like the gap between London and Norwich, Bristol Big." In the Golden Deer Merchant near the bay wharf, Baron Cecil, who came by train, said to five or six businessmen from London in the Old World: "Here are some important reports about the urbanization of China's East Coast Republic. All aspects of information have been observed and sorted out by my assistants and I over the past few years. I have posted them once before. This is a new batch of insights and descriptions. I hope you can help me bring them to the Duke of Buckingham. He is a man with ideals and ambitions. Ambitious people are also highly appreciated by the king and popular in the parliament, I hope I can help him, that's all I can do."

"In addition, I hope that you yourself, after returning to London, will also try to write as many travel notes, sentiments, experiences, knowledge and other things as possible, and introduce everything on the east coast to more English people, so that people from the southern New World Fresh air being breathed by more people is key to driving change in every aspect of society. Ah, do some of you have relatives in Norwich, Bristol, Birmingham, etc.? I hope you Being able to influence your family, relatives or friends, talk to your local city officials and tell them to be smart about planning their cities. These cities have grown a lot in recent years, but overall they are still small, and there is still time to correct them. "

(End of this chapter)