Rise of the 1630s South America

Chapter 746 Scorching Economy ([-])

In the late summer and early autumn, the Milin Lake Basin is a busy scene.After years of continuous development, this vast wilderness, originally dominated by swamps, reeds and aquatic shrubs, has now become a rich and fertile land.

A large piece of flat land was neatly divided into three parts of the third rank, one high field, one middle field, and one sub-field.The three fields are all planted with crops, either wheat, soybeans, or alfalfa, and the ridges between each mu of land have also been fully utilized, such as broad beans, black beans, and the "high sugar 48" that the Northern Botanical Garden has just begun to promote. "Beets, after all, every piece of land is used to its full potential.

Here and there in the fields were piles of hay, not forage for rural animals—they had higher grades of alfalfa—but what farmers used to fertilize their fields.The forage is usually harvested by the children after school in the wild public land. On the east bank where the land is sparsely populated, the unallocated public land is covered with weeds taller than these children.

Children are busy in the fields, but adults are not lazy. They carry large and small bags of soybeans and sell them to merchants who come to the village to buy them (these people usually also work part-time as grocers).And if these businessmen need it, they don't mind using their family's cart to serve as a transporter for them.Anyway, there are more and more sandy roads in the countryside nowadays, and the road conditions are not bad. Why not use the carts that are not used by the family to help transport soybeans and earn a freight to subsidize the family?

Farmers in the Milin Lake area have a tradition of planting soybeans, which is related to the active local oil mill economy.In today’s Meilin Township, Qishan Township, and Qiuyi Township in Meilin County, and Heyangbao in Xiayihe County, almost every household in these four townships has planted soybeans, and some radical farmers have even planted soybeans twice a year. , As for the grains that he and his family eat on weekdays, they all rely on outsourcing, which can be called a pioneer in the commercialization of agricultural products.

Among these people, a group of the earliest handicraftsmen used their surplus commodities to complete primitive accumulation, together with a group of soldiers returning from the battlefield, private capital began its initial pursuit of profit.

Of course they started from the agriculture they are most familiar with!Therefore, the locally abundant soybeans have started a thriving road of deep processing.Industries using soybeans as raw materials such as oil mills (oil pressing) and bean product workshops began to flourish. Especially after the Genoese opened up a small market for soybean oil on the east coast in Europe, these industries became more popular and flourished.

In Qishan Township, Meilin County, where the soybean industry is most developed today, among other things, more than a dozen new oil mills were added last year alone, and soybean oil production capacity increased by 32%, completely consuming all the new soybean production capacity this year.Not to mention, they even imported a large amount of soybean stocks from neighboring Zhenhai County, Xiayihe County and Dongfang County, otherwise it would not be enough for production and consumption.

It's incredible how quickly the soybean industry has grown.The officials of the Ministry of Agriculture even felt a chill from this. The commercial capital that Meilin County has finally accumulated is gradually entering the industrial field. This is a good thing, but everyone has chosen to enter the soybean industry in a rush. The risk is too great.You know, what is the state of the international market today? Everyone is blindsided. Although the bean cake industry continues to be optimistic, and the soybean oil industry has also grown rapidly for three years, who knows what will happen next year?In case of changes in the international market, how can such a large domestic production capacity of soybean products be digested?

For this reason, the Ministry of Industry and Commerce and the Ministry of Agriculture sent a joint research team to Meilin County in February of this year (1649) to start a thorough investigation of the local soybean industry.Liang Jian, who is the magistrate of Meilin County, was very puzzled by the fact that the central government sent personnel to conduct research. He pointed out to a group of investigators that last year, various economic indicators in Meilin County increased rapidly across the board, and a large number of handicraft workshops were newly added.In addition to those oil-pressing workshops, two new paper-making workshops (to produce pulp from bean stalks), two carpentry workshops, and a machine-repair workshop were added.

作坊的不断兴建带动了土建的蓬勃发展，去年一整年，梅林县全县共消耗了土建工程费14.8万元、钢铁1100余吨、水泥1900余吨、煤1.35万吨、砖9500万块、圆木4220根，极大地带动了本县及邻县的相关产业发展。

All in all, the economic scale of Meilin County has increased by about 30% in the past year, and the government's fiscal revenue has also greatly increased.Correspondingly, ordinary people have also shared the benefits of economic development. This can be seen from the increase in sales of cotton cloth and leather goods in state-owned department stores. When there are no other investment channels (such as buying land), they suffer from inflation. People who are troubled (the average wages of workers have gradually increased from 4-5 yuan to 6-7 yuan in recent years, and prices have risen to a similar degree) have also begun to get used to consumption.

Although the Meilin County government is quite satisfied with the economic development in the past year, the central government has found that the economy is in danger of overheating from the perspective of the overall situation.With the end of the nearly three-year war and the unchanging domestic inflation trend, private capital began to have more and more vigorous investment impulses. Therefore, various small workshops and small businesses began to spring up in China. The territory of the East Coast Republic.And because most of these private capitals are transformed from commercial capitals, they generally lack the accumulation of industrial technology and can only start with agricultural, forestry, fishery and animal husbandry products with low thresholds. Among them, soybeans and related industries in Meilin County, The machine milling industry in Zhenhai County is the two most prominent industries.

These two industries are characterized by low barriers to entry, sufficient raw materials and ready sales markets, so they quickly attracted a large amount of capital to enter.At the same time, the United Industrial Credit Bank has also extended a large amount of loans to these enterprises, and the total amount is believed to have reached as much as 50 million yuan.But in this prosperity, the officials of the Government Council also quickly saw the danger, that is, there is no doubt that the people on the east coast have produced goods far exceeding their own needs, and these huge surplus goods must be fully absorbed by overseas markets. In order to maintain the sustainable development of these industries.Otherwise, once the foreign market changes, these domestic industries with overproduction will face catastrophe. It is good luck that more than two-thirds of the workshops that are busy starting production are not dumped.

Obviously, the Government Affairs Council cannot bear such a tragic economic adjustment. Therefore, it is inevitable to send personnel to investigate these two overheated industries and regulate the total production capacity. This is also the reason why the central research team has stationed in Meilin County. The bureaucrats of the Government Council who exploded the domestic soybean industry due to changes in the international market agreed that this industry can no longer be allowed to develop indefinitely, and macro-control is imperative!

As the single-handed founder of the soybean industry, Liang Jian, the magistrate of Meilin County, is very disapproving of this. He finally found a way to develop the local industry (in fact, he tried to develop the machine flour industry before, but was hired by a large number of ducks with cheap Brazilian labor. The competition between milling workshops in the Lake area collapsed), and they were preparing to show their strengths, but they did not expect that the higher-ups would send people to interfere, which is really unreasonable!

To this end, he pointed out that not only the Genoese ordered a batch of soybean oil in the Qingdao market this year, but also the Dutch from South Africa next door, and there were also businessmen from the United Kingdom - a war-torn country whose butter production has declined. It has reached the lowest point in history, so it began to try to import some cheap soybean oil from the East Coast.The orders from these overseas markets are already enough for the large and small oil mills in Meilin County to start production for half a year. Now you actually want me to pay attention to controlling the scale. Are you kidding me?

In addition to soybean oil, the market prospect of soybean cake, another by-product of the oil extraction process, is also becoming more and more popular.The residue left after oil extraction is rich in nutrition, contains a lot of protein and fat, and is a very good feed. At present, the Ministry of Army and the Ministry of Agriculture on the east coast are purchasing in large quantities; in addition, this bean cake can also be used to fertilize the fields. , Since the second half of last year, sugarcane and tobacco planters in northern Brazil have started to place orders for imports one after another, and take them back to improve the plantations that have exhausted their land due to planting sugarcane and tobacco.It is said that the effect is not bad, so this year's bean cake orders will further increase is a high probability event.In this case you asked me to pay attention to the control scale, are you still kidding me?

The joint investigation team sent by the central government returned to the capital in dismay amidst the unanimous disdain from the top and bottom of Meilin County.However, this has not changed the determination of the central government to control the production scale, reduce the economic heat, improve the industrial structure, and reduce inflation. Therefore, starting from March this year, Meilin County may find it difficult to receive credit support from the United Industrial Credit Bank. This undoubtedly poured cold water on the local overheated economy.

After all, the economy is in danger of getting out of control. It is much more reliable to make adjustments by yourself first than to let it recover on its own after the explosion.Now that the European War is gradually ending, industrial and agricultural production is gradually recovering, and politicians from various countries have begun to divert their energy from religion and war and quickly turn to economic development.In this way, European countries that are already prevalent in mercantilism will have great hostility to foreign commodities.At that time, trade frictions and trade barriers will start to intensify, and the sales of goods on the east coast will inevitably be difficult. This will further lead to a decline in the profit margin of goods on the east coast and a shrinking market, and then trigger a series of negative chain reactions in the country.

This is not cause for concern, as this situation seems to have emerged in some countries and regions.

(End of this chapter)