Dianbai County Government.

There were more than 20 men sitting around the lobby, all dressed in gorgeous clothes and natural appearance. Most of them were dressed in gentry and wealthy businessmen, chatting together. Most of them came from Taiwan and Hong Kong, and were famous wealthy businessmen in the club, while others were local gentry. If they really wanted to find something in common for this group of people, their wealth would be mostly related to sugar, cotton, and grain.

"Attention, the consul and the governor are here." Suddenly, a sharp-eyed whispered. The lobby became quiet, and the group of people stood up straight.

After everyone had greeted him, Lin Shizhang said, "You are here to help Dianbai to relieve the national crisis. I thank you here."

As soon as these words were spoken, everyone's expressions changed slightly. Everyone came to make money. Who cares about the national crisis and not the national crisis? If it weren't for the guidance and persuasion of Li Mingxun, who would have been willing to throw the money into the four battles of western Guangdong?

Li Mingxun smiled: "Today we are all together, we only talk about business, not state affairs. However, Lord Lin and I prepared a charity recruitment dinner in Zhenhailou. You must enjoy it in the evening."

"That's that's that!" Everyone laughed.

Those who can sit here are either people in the community system or have a close relationship with the community. They all know what the dinner is. They have to pay a hundred to five hundred taels of silver to be qualified to enter. This method emerged in Hong Kong. The money raised is either to build a shanghai house or provide food for the widow. It is a good thing to accumulate merit. Every time the money donated at the dinner will be announced and posted in various places. Although each family has received the money, it has a good reputation and can meet many business partners at the dinner. It is a pleasure to donate money to the frontline soldiers. This dinner is naturally a matter of only a hundred taels left. You are all big businessmen, and no one cares about the money.

Lin Shizhang sighed, saying that the heart is not as good as ever, and he could not have thought that he would talk about money all the time and flow with merchants. But he also knew that a dinner party, hundreds of people attended, and the donations he received were often tens of thousands, which was not a small amount.

After everyone sat down, Li Mingxun said: "The battle in Guangdong has come to an end for the time being. The club has left many soldiers and horses. The soldiers under the governor are strong. The four western Guangdong prefectures are already peaceful. Mingxun, on behalf of the club and governor, promised that he would do his best to keep this paradise."

No one will take this kind of guarantee to heart. Everyone respects Li Mingxun, but they will never pay money just by saying his promise. After all, no emperor of the Ming Dynasty wanted to defend the country. Although several of them had fulfilled the promise of the king's death to the country, the country was not preserved at all. Everyone did not listen to the vernacular words, but only looked at the truth, making them believe that western Guangdong could be saved, and that the people were willing to invest money were not the 30,000 coalition forces in Gaozhou, nor the names of Lin Shizhang and Li Mingxun, but the facts.

Since Lin Shizhang took power in the middle of last year, the societies and United Bank have intervened in the exhibitions in Gaozhou and Qiongzhou on a large scale. The most representative one is the development of Shilu Iron Mine, and for this purpose, a Shilu Mining Company was also established.

Qiongzhou Prefecture provides mining rights and the colonization rights of Qiongzhou Shengli Village Club, accounting for one-quarter of the shares. Several veterans and members of the society invested 200,000 taels of funds and one-quarter of the shares. The society borrowed 300,000 yuan from United Bank and provided a full 3,000 strong slaves, accounting for half of the shares. It took several months to smash the Shilu Iron Mine and successfully began to produce rich iron ore at the beginning of this year.

In order to open this iron ore, the mining company also built roads, built ports, and also provided supporting hydraulic screening and crushing ore factories. So far, it has reached a monthly production of 4,000 tons of iron-rich ore. After screening and crushing, these ores will be shipped at Shilu Port and transported to a newly built steel plant in Taipei for refining.

Such a large-scale investment is enough to prove the community's judgment on western Guangdong. Not to mention anything else, at least Qiongzhou is absolutely safe.

After the end of the Guangzhou War, United Bank announced that it would provide rice and grain loan services to sugarcane farmers and cotton farmers in Leizhou and Qiongzhou, which further aroused the interest and confidence of merchants in western Guangdong. Today, Li Mingxun and Lin Shizhang organized them together, in the words of later generations, to attract investment. The purpose of merchants was to make money, while Lin Shizhang's purpose was to open resources in western Guangdong as much as possible to raise troops and expand military forces.

Many of these merchants are from Qiongzhou, and there are also gentry who defected to Lin Shizhang. During this period of time, Lin Shizhang cleaned up many gentry and won over many gentry. After compulsory means, the old order in western Guangdong was broken, and now the cake is to be divided again.

The purpose of today's investment promotion is to attract investment in western Guangdong, sugar and cotton. Let's talk about sugar sugar first. Qiongzhou and Leizhou have been sugar sugar production areas since ancient times. This place not only has water and soil suitable for sugarcane growth, but also has a long history of sugarcane processing. Many ponds produce white sugar and rock sugar with high product quality. The formation of Taiwan's sugar sugar industry is because a large number of sugarcane farmers and production technologies have been introduced from Leizhou.

Sucrose is a highly competitive commodity. Not to mention, in Asia, Japan, India, Persia and Ottoman are huge sucrose markets. Every year, there is a large amount of sucrose on ships from the East to Europe and the Americas. Whether it is the Portuguese, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, there is no resistance to high-quality white sugar and rock sugar. Even the waste produced by processing, or the black sugar, brown sugar and brown sugar obtained without deep processing, are also very popular in Japan.

There is no shortage of sugarcane in western Guangdong, no shortage of technology and people. The only thing that is lacking is capital. According to the general Ming officials' ideas, the most important thing to guarantee during the war was grain output. However, Lin Shizhang didn't think so. Grain output is indeed important, but silver is omnipotent. If you have silver, you can buy a large amount of cheap grain from Nanyang. The rice purchased from Nanyang is lower than that produced locally. What's more, the four prefectures in western Guangdong are not important grain-producing areas, and cash crops are more profitable than grain. This is a fact. As long as you have money and as long as your relationship with the community does not collapse, you will not be short of food.

Lin Shizhang waved his hand, and several officials around him gave a stack of information to everyone. A group of merchants looked at them one after another. Many people's first photo was wide open and their eyes were shining. The only look at Lin Shizhang was shocked. It was hard for them to imagine that this was a condition that a Ming official was willing to give.

In this opening plan, Lin Shizhang gave very preferential conditions, the most important method was the tax-packing system. Simply put, the Guangdong Governor and the local government will require all sugarcane and cotton farmers to plant only one cash crop and contract the right to purchase the crop to merchants. After the merchant obtains the contracting rights, he must purchase the farmers' cash crops when harvesting and bear the taxes of the farmers.

The merchant pays taxes for farmers in advance, and pays them in the form of precious metals such as gold and silver. Then, after selling the cash crops at the agreed prices of each party, the funds that the farmers deserve outside the taxes are allocated, and the funds allocated include grain, and the rest are paid in precious metals.

Of course, the governor's yamen did not care about anything after collecting taxes. The most important thing is that Lin Shizhang forced gentry from all over the country to formulate unified and lower rents, and the rent was also under taxes. After the court got the money, they would rent them from the gentry. In this way, the gentry landlords could not exploit the people, and there was no oppression from the tax collectors and other governments, and even the intermediate channels for commercial exchanges were reduced.

Farmers only plant sugarcane and cotton, and then transport the cotton and sugarcane to designated locations during the harvest season, and then they don’t have to worry about anything, because transportation and other tasks are the contractor’s business. These cash crops will be agreed upon before purchase. For farmers Laishui, the most important thing is the minimum purchase price. After paying the crops, the merchant will count them in person, calculate the price, then remove taxes and rents, and then complete the transaction in person. Farmers only need to inform the merchant in advance whether they need to pay grain or silver to themselves. Of course, the grain is limited, and each person has two stones per year, and the portion is completely spent in monetary terms.

During the whole process, farmers obtained income and survival information, the court obtained stable tax revenue, lifted the exploitation and oppression of farmers, and merchants obtained a monopoly on sugarcane and cotton in western Guangdong, and all the three parties benefited.

The clubs are actually profitable, and their biggest benefit is to support western Guangdong to continue to resist the Qing Dynasty without paying money in person. In addition, the clubs are the largest grain providers and liberate sugarcane fields in some territories. More importantly, they have obtained the right to purchase scarce materials such as cotton.

There are many unlucky people, and the ones who are at the forefront are gentry and landlords. They have no chance to exploit farmers and even have to ask the court for rent. Obviously, facing a powerful and domineering guy like Lin Shizhang, this must be a difficult process. The facts also prove that because of war, the rent is often temporarily owed by the court.

Although the rise of Taiwan's sugarcane cultivation industry once reduced the price of sugar sugar in the East, the war caused Fujian, another sugarcane production site, to be unable to provide sugar. Ocean navigation led by the advanced shipbuilding industry in the society, can sell such high-value products to the Middle East and South Asia. In the future, the price of sugar will remain strong, especially the price of high-quality sugar.

This is the case with sugar, and there is no need to mention cotton. Even buying cotton from India to Taiwan has great profits. Even though Qiongzhou's cotton production and quality are inferior, it is the only stable cotton supply point at present.

"Governor, I have no intention of questioning your authority. I would like to ask, how can these cane farmers and cotton farmers only plant this type of economic crop? We Chinese have a saying that if you have food in your hands, you will not panic." A businessman took the lead in asking.

Lin Shizhang smiled slightly and said, "Mr. Cheng, say."

Cheng Bi stood up with a smile. Because of Li Mingxun, the Hui merchant not only did not die in the Battle of Jiangyin, but instead became the executive manager of United Bank. When Cheng Bi left Jiangyin, he donated all his family wealth to the soldiers guarding the city, thus entering the community system.

"Before this, the United Bank will launch rice and grain loans to sugarcane farmers and cotton farmers. The terms stipulate that those who accept loans can only plant one cash crop. Moreover, the Governor's Office has issued a notice that farmers who accept similar clauses can exempt them from tax arrears two years ago. With the Governor's Office's tax exemption and the United Bank's rice and grain loans, this year, at least about 500,000 acres of cash crops in Qionglei can be handed over to everyone for contracting. Even if the income of farmers has not increased after this year, it will help them exempt the exploitation of landlords and officials, and it will attract many people." Cheng Bi said loudly.

Everyone whispered and discussed it, and nodded one after another.

"How will the minimum acquisition price be set?" someone asked again.

Lin Shizhang said: "It's very simple. This price must ensure that the sugarcane produced by farmers normally. After paying taxes and rent, cotton can still obtain enough food. The income is more than planting rice. This is the most basic. Of course, if the prices of these two types of cash crops were high, the purchase price would be increased as appropriate. The overall price will be formulated by the sugar industry, cotton industry association, governor's office and Dongfan organized by you to show fairness."

Everyone looked at each other and there was no problem. Lin Shizhang said: "The yamen of United Bank and Qionglei have prepared the contract letter and divided the economic crop production areas. You can choose them by yourself. If there is any overlap, you will openly bid on the purchase price. Please."

A group of businessmen walked out, Lin Shizhang looked at Cheng Bi and Li Mingxun and said, "If there were no ready-made rules and regulations provided by the club and the officials sent by the members, it would be a lot of trouble."

Li Mingxun smiled and did not answer. In fact, similar investment promotions have been conducted many times in Taiwan and Yongning, and are not limited to cash crops. The administrative system of the community has long been mastered.

"Do you want a rest? Next is the whaling permit in the North Sea and the recommendation of fishermen to go out to sea. Many fishing giants have been waiting for a long time." Cheng Bi asked from the side.

Lin Shizhang shook his head: "No need to rest, keep going."

Half a quarter of an hour later, many fishing merchants came in and bargained on whaling and fishing.

Similar investment promotion lasted for ten days. Lin Shizhang was so busy that he did not touch the ground, but he brought many taxes to the four western Guangdong prefectures. The only drawback is that a large number of industries in western Guangdong were occupied by non-Ming merchants, and they did not make much contribution to the people just by solving the problem of food and clothing. However, Lin Shizhang was already very satisfied. His greatest wish was to obtain more military pay on the basis of not exploiting the people. Now this goal has been achieved. The tax revenue this year will definitely exceed one million, and there will be more next year, which is more than exploiting the people.

The four western Guangdong prefectures are not rich areas in Guangdong, but there are also many high-value industries, including sugarcane and cotton, which are not to mention economic crops such as sugarcane and cotton. The whaling industry in Beihai has always provided royalty whale oil, as well as the Zhuchi that has just been snatched from the sacrificial people, and there are also newly opened species of clubs, in addition to Tiandu Iron Mine, there are also kaolin in Hepu.

Whether it is iron ore, kaolin, or various economic crops, it can be seen from the launch of these projects that the association only regards the four western Guangdong prefectures as the basic raw materials. Iron ore will be sent to Keelung to smelter iron and steelmaking, kaolin will be fired into porcelain at its base camp, sugarcane is deep processing in Taipei, and cotton is the material for Xixindi hydraulic textile industry.
Chapter completed!