"If they want to lobby, why bother lobbying me alone? There are their embassies in Shinkyung, and major East India companies also have shopping malls. You can go to Shinkyung to lobby." Li Junwei said lightly to Joseph.

Joseph said, "They still want to show you some respect, after all, you are the one who can really influence decisions."

Li Junwei frowned, thought for a while, and said, "Okay, let them send a Mandarin-speaking representative. I can repair and wait in Said Port."

The representative selected by the Netherlands and British colonial companies was Sir Thomas. This sir is the highest commander of the British East India Company in Myanmar and has a deep relationship with the empire. His father David was once the first British partner of the Supreme Emperor of the Empire and an old friend. Sir Thomas was also stationed in Penang and Shin Kyung for several years. Instead, he spent very little time in London. Thomas, who was 40 years old, was very strong and courageous, so he was well deservedly selected as the representative and arrived at Port Said after Li Junwei.

Because of the revival of the Maritime Silk Road, Said Port became very prosperous in just a few years, surpassing Xijin City. It is also the most open place in the Ottomans, with buildings rising here.

"Actually, you don't have to worry too much. Not to mention the British and Dutch merger has not yet become a reality. Even if it becomes a reality, the Empire may not stand on the opposite side of the two countries." Li Junwei held a glass of red wine produced in South Africa, tasted it, put it aside, and complained: "The wine merchants of the Empire hope that I can like their wine. Unfortunately, I am not very interested in red wine, so I plan to use grape juice instead for the banquet tonight, so that I can pretend to like it very much."

"You are really good at it." Sir Thomas said with a smile, but he objected to Li Junwei's words that are related to the fate of the company and said: "Although in the eyes of ordinary businessmen, we are all giant companies? We are privileged merchants, but on the side of the empire? We are just a vine? For a long time, we have relied on the empire as a big tree to maintain operations and profits? We really can't afford the price of being an enemy of the empire. I hope you can understand my difficulties."

Li Junwei smiled: "Can I tell you the same thing? In your eyes? I am the brother of the imperial emperor and a noble prince, but I can't decide everything. Who can the empire form an alliance with and who will be enemies with? What is it about the interests of the country? That is the will of the country, not the will of someone."

"I understand what you said, but we don't want the Empire to misunderstand our attitude." Thomas said in embarrassment: "In fact, we don't mean to be enemies of the Empire."

Li Junwei asked back: "Is that so? But I heard from the Jews that there are many shareholders of the Dutch East India Company among those who support Prince Orange? There are also many British businessmen eagerly looking forward to him going to London, aren't they?"

"Yes? But that's because their identities are not just shareholders of East India Company, but also other identities." Thomas was clever and clever? The explanation was very clear. Li Junwei didn't agree. He didn't care if he was not an identity? What's important is his behavior.

Li Junwei thought for a while: "It's too complicated? What you said is too complicated? I can't give you the answer you want. Your Excellency Thomas, what I want to remind you is that everything is driven by interests. Assuming your mother country is an enemy of the empire, then your existence will damage the interests of the empire, so there are only two ways out for you to choose.

Leaving the motherland, termination of relations with the Netherlands, and the United Kingdom......"

"There is no such possibility, so I'll ask for a second way out." Thomas replied with a quick decision.

Li Junwei said: "The second thing is simple. Let your behavior be in line with the interests of the empire as much as possible. If your country starts war with us and your behavior is beneficial to the empire, then I think we will turn a blind eye."

Thomas nodded: "Actually, I mean that, but I haven't thought of a specific solution yet, so I want to return with you on the boat. Please forgive me."

"My boat ride? Your Excellency Thomas, if you don't have a suitable method, it's useless to go to Shin Kyung. For a little illusory hope, do you think it's worth it?" Li Junwei asked back.

Thomas quickly said: "It's not just because of this, I have another important matter when I go to Shin Kyung this time."

"Is that so, what else can you do to go to Shen Jing to solve it?" Li Junwei didn't understand.

In fact, the contradiction between several colonial companies and the empire was not only in the political behavior of their home country, but also in trade monopoly. The reason why these East India companies are called East India companies is to monopolize the East-West trade in the country. The merchant ships of the imperial merchants could not enter the ports of these two countries at all, in order to maintain a monopoly on Eastern goods, which is unacceptable to the empire that has always adhered to the principle of free trade.

On the contrary, colonial companies of the two countries can enter the empire's port trade. In terms of trade, the two sides are in an unequal situation. For a long time, the empire believed that they could open the doors of the two countries through diplomatic means, but the results were not good. On the contrary, the empire had formed similar agreements with Denmark, Sweden and France. After all, these are not powerful maritime trading countries. Their East India companies have limited strength and their transportation capacity cannot meet the domestic demand for Eastern goods. The goods sent by the empire merchants are always much cheaper than those who pass by the Netherlands and Britain.

In the two countries, the biggest opponents are naturally the East India Company, which monopolizes East-West trade. Therefore, after completely understanding that this problem cannot be solved, the empire began to tighten its trading authority for the East India Company of the two countries, and did not allow them to enter ports outside the empire for trade, and also restricted ports in the South China Sea.

For the British East India Company, this is acceptable. After all, it did not affect the purchase of oriental goods. However, the Hong Kong foot trade was affected and the local profits were reduced. However, the Dutch East India Company was even more affected. After the two sides decided to win and lose, the Empire allowed the Dutch East India Company to colonize Java for 30 years, have Ambon strongholds, and promised to renew the contract. However, the Empire has now clearly refused to continue the contract renewal. Within two years, the Dutch East India Company will lose its largest trading location in Nanyang.

Because of these tightening policies, Shin Kyung is no longer within the scope of the colonial company's permission. Major colonial companies set up branches there, which are more about solving political and diplomatic issues than conducting trade.

"It's mainly a question of name change. We all want the empire to re-characterize us. We are trading companies, not colonial companies." Thomas responded.

Li Junwei shook his head, not understanding the reason, while Thomas smiled and helped Li Junwei taste the quality of these red wines and explained the matter seriously.

The word colonization was originally a relatively neutral word, but as the title of Western colonial companies became more and more derogatory, Europeans did not understand these. When major cities in the empire were listed, they still had the word colonial companies. However, the colonial companies of the empire avoided from the beginning, either called development companies or pioneering companies.

Originally, Europeans didn't care. After all, their behavior in the East was originally a colonial act, but with the time of retirement, they found that the company's business was no longer colonial, but trade.

In an era when colonial behavior was prevalent, the order of the Eastern ocean was in the hands of Europeans, especially the Dutch. However, after the rise of the empire, there had been a new hegemony in the vast seas from Cape Town to the Pacific Ocean. This local power formulated new rules, emphasizing trade and order, which could accommodate all European countries for trade, but no forces were allowed to colonize. Simply put, trade could make money, but it was not possible to grab territory.

In the past decade, major colonial companies have not built forts to control land and enslave the indigenous people, because they found that since the empire controlled the Nanyang area and restored the Han areas in China, all the goods they needed could be provided by the empire, and plantings were developed everywhere, while the company itself enslaved the indigenous people, reclaimed the land, planted, harvested, and processed the cost.

From the perspective of spices, the first batch of the empires stolen peppers with large amounts of small amounts of pepper. Pepper plantations were everywhere in the South Ocean. As the empire ruled the South Ocean, even lilacs that took more than ten years of growth were planted. Then the indigenous supply was really meaningless, so a strange phenomenon occurred. The price of nutmeg purchased by the Dutch in Ambon, a high-yield area of ​​nutmeg is more than twice that of the direct purchase in Penang. In Penang, a trader could buy it with money. He didn't have to wear armor, carry short spears and muskets like Ambon, and endure indigenous attacks and harsh environments.

If colonization cannot obtain high-profit commodities, then there is only one way to make money, that is, to directly rule and exploit local indigenous people and collect poll taxes. However, this model will also fail in the end. Any indigenous tribe who came into contact with the imperial merchants can easily obtain firearms, resulting in a huge increase in the cost of conquest.

All companies came to the East to make money. Instead of buying guns and cannons, they hired European soldiers to conquer those vicious indigenous tribes. Why didn’t they build ships and then directly purchase goods from cities such as Penang and Huacheng to transport them back to Europe? Even if it’s not even built a ship, wouldn’t it be okay to hire Chinese ships?

The direct result of this is that today's East India companies in various countries are becoming more and more like trading companies, rather than colonial companies. Especially East India companies in countries such as France, Sweden, and Denmark come to the East three or five ships, or even one or two ships every year, and have no intention of colonial conquest at all, and are completely trade.

The Netherlands and Britain have a different situation. They use their old relationships to establish good relations with some indigenous tribes or the rulers of the small sultanate countries and monopolize import and export trade in these regions. These can obtain cheap goods and can also purchase goods from the empire to sell them. However, as the empire's tentacles expand, this kind of business becomes more and more difficult to do, and the cost becomes higher and higher.

Nowadays, European countries that still insist on colonizing east of the Cape of Good Hope, that is, Portugal, the traditional ally of the empire, are only in East Africa. They have no need to expand their heritage left by their ancestors. In Thomas' words, since we no longer do colonization, why do we still call colonial companies?

What made Britain and the Netherlands change their names naturally not only sounded true or not, but the most important thing was the actual interests. In the diplomacy of the empire, the East India companies in France, Dan, and Rui were trading companies, while the East India companies in Britain and the Netherlands had the authority to issue currencies, formulate laws and organize military forces, so they were defined as political entities. Therefore, they were subject to many restrictions within the empire and within the sphere of influence, which also caused the two companies to spend a lot of unnecessary expenses.

Therefore, Thomas not only wanted the company to gain the status of a trading company, but also wanted to explore another possibility. Assuming that the company can exchange for a more free trade position by selling some existing colonies. After all, for a company, the biggest purpose is to make money. No matter what you transport from the East, it is better to transport gold and silver back. It is restricted from participating in trade within the empire and within the sphere of influence, which is the biggest loss for merchants.

Li Junwei knew that these were due to the nature of merchants. The transformation from colonial companies to trading companies was a manifestation of the two East India companies not wanting to take responsibility. For example, in the Goa War that year, in order to prevent the Mughals from threatening the colonies of various countries on the subcontinent, the coalition forces of various countries confronted them. As a colonial company, the British East India companies had to pay for troops. On the contrary, the East India companies of France and other countries did not have these requirements, just because they were trading companies.

"Of course I support your application for reasonable appeals, but it also deserves its name. The definition of trading companies and colonial companies in imperial laws is completely different. Whether they can be done depends on your behavior. I have to remind you not to always think about your own interests in your head. The Empire is not a philanthropist. As the saying goes, do more things that are beneficial to the Empire, rather than just getting close to it and making connections." Li Junwei said to him.

Li Junwei was not very cold about Thomas, but in Suez City, he met Zhao Wenting, the Commissioner of the Americans of the Ministry of Overseas Affairs. This specialist from the tax office wanted to go to the Americas to perform his duties, but did not take a boat to Kingsoft directly, but chose to move westward because he was also an envoy of the imperial emperor and wanted to inspect all colonial work, especially to go to Nangang, a new colony in South America to declare the sovereignty of the empire.
Chapter completed!