Chapter 59 New System
It was late April 1627, and the construction sites in Yulin Bay were in full swing. Hundreds of local people were working day and night to build various infrastructure under the organization of Chuanzhong.
While everyone was having lunch and resting, Ning Qi held up a tin trumpet and stood on a high place next to the construction site to promote the various benefits of joining Haihan to these people.
"After joining Haihan, your children will be able to attend the schools we set up and become literate. In the future, whether they take the imperial examination or work for us, they will have a good future!"
"If you have a headache, brain fever, major illness or minor calamity in the future, we have doctors who will provide you with treatment. You no longer have to travel dozens of miles to the county to see a doctor!"
"When you join Haihan, you can apply for the allocation of twenty acres of farmland! There are no conditions attached! You only need to pay 10% of your income in taxes every year! We will provide grain and agricultural tools and provide guidance throughout the process to ensure that every household can have A good harvest! ”
Ning Qi kept repeating Haihan's various preferential conditions for recruiting people, and his mouth became dry after hearing it. However, the use of this simple and crude propaganda method had quite a good effect. After he stopped, people immediately gathered around to inquire about the detailed registration procedures.
Of course, the people are most concerned about the issue of cultivated land, especially the Han people who have mastered basic farming techniques. They want to know how Haihan will protect their rights and interests after the cultivated land is allocated to them. You must know that this area is still nominally under the rule of the Ming Dynasty. The Haihan people allocate farmland on their behalf. In the future, the Ming government will most likely not recognize the ownership of these lands.
Yu Dashan, who had been recruited by Haihan, responded to this question on his behalf: "The Ming army that came to Yulin a few days ago is still locked up in the camp on the upper reaches of Tiandu River! Although the leader, General Luo, was put back , but he has made an oath to the Haihan people that he will not go against Haihan again in the future, and he will also open up joints for the Haihan people in Yacheng. When the time comes, the Haihan people will come forward to negotiate with the government. We ordinary people are worried.”
Yu Dashan's words quickly dispelled most people's worries, because it was indeed the case. The fact that the Ming army was captured by Haihan was well known in Yulin Bay and was not a secret. If the government can't do anything to deal with the Haihan people, then naturally it can't interfere in the affairs of Yulin Bay.
Moreover, the Haihan people set tax standards much lower than the government, and they also provided grain seeds, agricultural tools, and technical guidance. These were conditions that the government could not provide. It was indeed difficult for the people to refuse such a temptation.
Under Yu Dashan's encouragement, people at the scene expressed their willingness to join the team and work for Haihan in the future.
In addition to these Han people, Li people working on the construction site also received the same invitation. Their thoughts on joining the gang were more practical. During this time, they worked for the Haihan people and received food and other materials as rewards. This kind of cooperation has significantly improved their living standards and also made them aware of the Haihan people. The strength of the Han Dynasty was enough to change the living conditions of the Li people.
For those young Li people who yearn for life outside the mountains, this is of course an excellent opportunity. Fu Li, the young master of Fushandong, was already very familiar with the Haihan people, and the courtesy he received made the Li people think that Haihan was a partner worth relying on and trusting.
In order to facilitate the recruitment of Li people into the group, Haihan even set up a coordination organization to be responsible for Haihan's various liaison affairs in the Li-controlled areas, and Fu Li obtained an important position in it. With this joint effort, Li people have also enthusiastically signed up to join, hoping to get better treatment from Haihan through new cooperation methods.
After five days of publicity at various construction sites, Ning Qi and others had already recruited the places that were originally scheduled to take ten days to complete. As for the newly recruited people, the executive committee plans to organize them and send them to the valley where the Yulin Bay waste salt field is located for resettlement, and arrange for them to rebuild the salt field there and resume salt production as soon as possible.
In the end, more than 60 households with more than 200 people were sent to the salt farm for resettlement. Because of his active performance, Yu Dashan was also appointed as the senior manager of the salt farm, responsible for the resettlement of this group of people and subsequent production organization.
Early one morning in early May 1627, the first members of the salt field took two ships across Yulin Bay and arrived at their destination. A trestle-style pier has been built here by Shuanghuan Group in advance, and residential areas have been designated for building housing.
After the ship docked, people unloaded various building materials, tools and living supplies carried on the ship to the shore, and then began to build residences under the command of craftsmen. For a period of time, most of them could only live in tents temporarily. During this period, the first thing they had to complete was to build their own residences, and then start to renovate the production facilities of the salt field.
According to the plan of the executive committee, this old salt field, which originally used stone troughs to dry salt, will be gradually transformed into a large-scale cement salt pond, and the original seawater irrigation device will be changed to wind power and animal power until more advanced use is made later. Efficient steam power.
However, everything is difficult at the beginning. In the early stage, it is not easy for these newly organized people to make great efforts to build various infrastructures in the salt field.
Because the actual working environment here is different from the land reclamation promoted by the public, they will soon discover that what the Haihan people are planning to do here is not to organize them to reclaim farmland, but to transform the tidal flats by the sea. After forming a salt farm, they became salt households specializing in the production of table salt.
The large-scale production of illegal salt was of course illegal in the Ming Dynasty. However, the mountains in Yulin Bay are high and the emperor is far away, and the government seems to have no control over it. The only thing the people need to worry about is whether the salt farm built by the Haihan people can really bring stable profits?
The Executive Committee certainly has no doubt about this. According to the target set by the Ministry of Industry, the production of salt will reach 1,000 tons in the first year after the salt farm is put into operation. This number may not be considered large, but it is by no means small. According to historical records, before the Travelers came here, the annual salt output of the entire Hainan Island was only about 300 tons.
But even reaching such a production capacity is by no means Haihan’s long-term goal. According to the plan of the Ministry of Industry, in the future, multiple salt farms with larger production scale will continue to be built in Yinggehai, Danzhou and other places on Hainan Island. The salt produced is not only a commodity that Haihan will use for export for profit in the future, but also a raw material to meet the future development of chemical industry.
(End of chapter)