Rise of the 1630s South America

November 1630, 11, light rain.The armed merchant ship of the West India Company, the Orange River, sailed away a week ago. Before leaving, Captain Couette euphemistically suggested that they hope to build an official dock for the convenience of berthing when he comes next time.

In the past two days, the industrial zone on the south bank of the Dayu River is in full swing, with paper-making workshops, cement kilns, and lime kilns put into operation one after another.Leaving aside the paper-making workshop, strictly speaking, these two vertical earthen kilns are obsolete enterprises with low production capacity, high energy consumption, and heavy pollution in modern times, but now the time-traveling people have limited conditions, so they can only launch such kilns. soil project.

These two kilns are vertical cylinder kilns, which work by feeding materials from the top and discharging materials from the bottom.Batching, grinding, feeding and discharging are all done manually.The designed capacity of the cement kiln is 10 tons per day, and the designed capacity of the lime kiln is 20 tons per day.Of course, this is a theoretical value that can only be achieved when the supply of raw materials is sufficient for continuous production.The biggest problem at present is the shortage of labor force, especially the mining of limestone.One is the lack of manpower, and the other is that there is no machinery or explosives, and the mining is all done by hand, which is extremely inefficient. On a good day, two or three tons can be mined, but on a bad day, there is not a ton.

Under such circumstances, the cement kiln and lime kiln can only stop production naturally, and the coal consumption per ton of material is astonishingly high, and the little coal on the barge is not enough to toss for too long.In desperation, the executive committee temporarily shut down the two earthen shaft kilns after producing some cement and lime to solve the urgent need.After the limestone reaches a certain reserve, the production will be restarted.

Today is the monthly plenary meeting of the Executive Committee, where major issues are generally discussed.

"The successive commissioning of brick kilns, cement kilns, and lime kilns has given everyone great encouragement." Ma Ganzu, chairman of the executive committee, made an impassioned statement at the meeting, "In the next period of time, we should make persistent efforts and strive for We have achieved greater breakthroughs on all fronts. Next, let’s talk about the next work arrangements.”

"Let me come first. Some vegetable seeds sown last month have successfully emerged and are growing well. After a while, they can be transplanted smoothly. Maybe in the near future, there will be many more delicious green leafy vegetables on our table "Agriculture committee member Kinkola took the lead in speaking, "But this is not the point. What I want to tell Chairman Ma and all members is that it has entered November and officially entered the soybean planting season in South America. Due to various reasons, the Agricultural Bureau (The lower-level organization directly under the Agricultural Committee) has not been very manpower, which has caused the progress of farmland reclamation to be very unsatisfactory. As of yesterday, only 11 acres of farmland have been reclaimed. And we currently have 400 bags of 200 kilograms of soybeans, and the preliminary calculation of the sowing area It is 5000 mu. Therefore, I hope that the executive committee can carefully consider the situation of the Bureau of Agriculture with a scientific attitude, coordinate the relationship between various departments, and implement the land reclamation plan of the Bureau of Agriculture as soon as possible.”

When Jin Kela said this, all the committee members who were eager to try it suddenly died down.Indeed, the matter could not be dragged on any longer.The food brought in will always be eaten one day, and it is impossible for the traveler to just sit and eat like this, so the focus of work for the next period of time must be shifting to the agricultural port.

The rest of the committee members hastily submitted their plans.For example, the trial production of refractory bricks proposed by industry committee member Majia; the construction of seaport docks, residential areas, and industrial area roads proposed by transportation committee member Xiao Bailang; the construction of red brick cement walls proposed by army committee member Peng Zhicheng; build and so on.

Ma Ganzu then coordinated with everyone, and soon, a temporarily mobilized army of 100 people was assigned to the Agricultural Bureau.At the same time, as a supporting project in the soybean planting area, irrigation canals were also required to be built at the same time.

As the saying goes, more people are more powerful. After the executive committee mobilized the manpower, although most of them were novices, it only took 10 days. On November 11, 13 mu of land was reclaimed.

At the same time, the hundreds of meters of brick-and-concrete irrigation channels leading from the wetlands to the planting areas have almost been completed.Not only that, the construction madmen of the construction team built 3 biogas digesters and a public toilet in one breath after getting enough bricks and cement mortar.

On November 11, soybean planting officially started.

Soybean contains 20% fat, 40% protein, 10% sugar, and rich in vitamins.It is also widely used. In addition to extracting oil, it can also be used to make soybean milk, tofu, soy sauce, bean sprouts, soybean meal, paint, glycerin and so on.

As the crop with the largest planting scale and the most economic value across the world, soybean planting has attracted a lot of attention.Many women, old people and even children came to help. As a result, on November 11, 17 mu of soybeans had been sown successfully, one day earlier than originally planned.

I'm done with the great event of planting seeds.The Executive Committee began to carry out the second key project - the construction of the wharf.

Although the water depth of the Dayu River is average, the coastal waters on the left and right sides of the river mouth are all good deep water areas, which are suitable for building along-shore wharves.At present, the entire port project formulated by the Executive Committee includes: underwater topographic survey, geological survey, waterway, breakwater, port dredging road, anchorage, warehouse, storage yard, trestle, lighthouse, fort, etc., and the project volume is extremely huge.Of course, the executive committee didn't expect you to finish it in a short while.

The port is located on the north bank of the Big Fish River, facing the Atlantic Ocean.Both underwater topographic survey and geological survey can directly apply the data of the 21st century, which is more convenient.Directly outside the port is an open deep-water ocean surface, with an average water depth of 8 meters and a sandy seabed. Large ships can dock directly, making it an ideal anchorage.The only fly in the ointment is that it lacks the protection of natural breakwaters and needs to be built artificially.

The Construction Bureau (former construction team) under Xiao Bailang originally had 60 people, but this time an additional 100 people were mobilized to participate in the port construction.The planned port warehouses and storage yards are the first to be built. The warehouses are mainly large red brick bungalows, and the storage yard is behind the wharf, with a depth of 200 meters and a usable area of ​​5 square meters. However, it is essentially a flat grassland. That's all.The Executive Committee plans to pour cement into the storage yard to harden it when conditions permit in the future.

The construction of the Shugang Highway is also extremely important. The initial plan is to pave the road with the waste of fired bricks, and then compact it hard.Dig drainage ditches on the side of the road, so as to avoid potholes caused by the softening of the road surface in rainy days.Similarly, after the material pressure is relieved, the Executive Committee will eventually convert this road into a cement road.

As for the construction of breakwaters, lighthouses and forts, at present there is more than enough energy, and we can only leave it for the future.

In the executive committee's plan, the entire terminal will be completed in phases within two years.The first stage: the storage yard, warehouse and simple wooden trestle will be completed within two months; the second stage will be completed by February 1631, 2 at the latest.