After being "warned" by Vézé, Wang Haiyang somewhat forgot how he got back home. Before he took office, he was warned that "the prime minister has a term of office." This direct termination inevitably left too much room for imagination. For example, as long as the president issued an order, he could also appoint or dismiss the prime minister during his term of office. Not to mention that Vézé, the president of the Min dynasty, was still the emperor authorized by the people. This authorization transferred "the supreme legislative power, the supreme judicial power, and the supreme executive power" to Vézé. In theory, Vézé could dismiss anyone if he wanted to.
After all, the new prime minister was not an ordinary cadre. He also had his own way to deal with problems. Wang Haiyang thought about it carefully. Was there anything wrong with being a coward in front of the commander-in-chief? Showing worry about the future in front of a person at the peak of power, and then the strong said, "If you want to do it, do it. If you don't want to do it, get out." This should probably be regarded as a strong person asking a weak person like Wang Haiyang to move forward bravely.
Although this kind of thinking did make Wang Haiyang feel a lot more at ease, what saved Wang Haiyang's mood in the end was a kind of self-abandonment attitude. "When the person dies, the ball goes up. When the person isn't dead, the ball goes everywhere." It was much better to be dismissed if he did not do a good job than to be too scared to do it. So, Wang Haiyang, who tossed and turned for half the night, fell asleep.
When he woke up the next day, Wang Haiyang felt unexpectedly good. It was time to go to work, and it was time to hand over. Once he entered the familiar work, all the unpleasantness was dispelled by the intense work.
One of the important tasks of the Min dynasty in the near future was the North American region. China's monsoon climate caused many disasters in its vast territory. Drought and floods often occurred at the same time. People would habitually think that it was a drought in the north and a flood in the south, but in fact, there were many problems with both. What's more, the territory of the Min dynasty had expanded beyond the equator to the south, which meant that the entire territory of China had winter and summer at the same time, and there were more natural disasters.
At the end of 1881, the six provinces of North America were officially incorporated into the territory of the Min dynasty. Five years later, the Min dynasty found that the lowest temperature in this winter was about 20 degrees, and the temperature was similar to that of Shanxi. It was a good place to produce agricultural products stably. Unlike Shanxi, the six provinces of North America had vast plains and abundant water resources. Because it was cold, the insect infestation in this place was not serious. The seven hundred and forty million people of the Min dynasty were calculated on the basis of one jin of rations per person. They needed 3.8 million tons of grain a day. Under the three-field rotation system, the six North American provinces could export about 50 million tons of food. If they produced at full capacity, the annual output of the six provinces in North America could supply the entire Min dynasty with about two months of food. To some extent, it was difficult to sell food in the countryside because of the rapid development of the six North American provinces.
The Military Governor Of Vaize had already proposed a national backstop policy. The government had the obligation to ensure that the people of China would not starve to death. In order to achieve this, he had to first determine the agricultural output and formulate a plan for the storage and food supply. After this strategy was established, the whole Min dynasty also had basic confidence.
Wang Haiyang originally thought that this would become a simple discussion about agricultural production, but he did not expect that Zhang Jianguo, the Minister of Civil Affairs, who was in charge of household registration, had a point of view. "Now that the proportion of the country's urban population has reached 30%, if we look at it from a purely relief point of view, this 30% relief problem is easy, as the local government can take care of it. The difficulty was probably 70% of the rural population. But are these rural people short of land? On the whole, the lack of land seems to be very limited. "
Having been a cadre in Zhejiang Province, Wang Haiyang was actually very clear about the so-called lack of land. When land existed as wealth, everyone was short of land. Now there was no land sale in the Min dynasty, so whether there was a lack of land or not depended on one's standpoint. As a member of the younger generation who had received a more systematic education, especially after learning the materialist dialectics and the social system part of the principle of freedom, the lack of land could be summed up in one sentence: "Everyone wants to occupy as much land as possible for the products produced on it."
As long as the ownership of the goods that could circulate on the market, everyone wanted to occupy it. These things could be sold for money. For example, the western mountainous area of Zhejiang was rich in chestnuts. No one usually went up the mountain to do anything, but when it came to picking chestnuts, disputes often occurred. Thanks to the popularity of desserts like mutton cake, chestnuts sold very well. A few years ago, it could even kill people. From this point of view, was there a lack of land? It seemed that there was probably a lack of land.
But in recent years, the deaths caused by chestnuts in Zhejiang suddenly disappeared. The reason was actually very simple. A large number of better quality chestnuts from Shandong and Anhui, which were not as rich as Zhejiang, occupied the market. Mutton cake and chestnuts might be delicious, but people couldn't only eat mutton cake and chestnuts every day. When the price of chestnuts in Zhejiang was very low, and it was even difficult to sell out at a low price, the competition for chestnuts suddenly decreased and even disappeared. There were no disputes, and there were protective gear for picking chestnuts, so injuries and deaths no longer occurred.
If it was just like that, Wang Haiyang might not feel that it left a deep impression. In order to win back the market, the Zhejiang Department of Agriculture tried to introduce more high-quality chestnut seedlings. The Department of Agriculture thought that the people in the mountainous areas of Zhejiang would be very interested in this, but in fact, the Department of Agriculture found that the mountain people were interested in the chestnut trees that had already grown. Every year, they went to the mountains to pick chestnuts and sell them. It was not a problem to just put in effort. They spent a lot of effort to plant and raise trees, and spent a few years waiting for the harvest. Most of the mountain people were actually not interested. From this point of view, there was no lack of land at all.
What left a deep impression on Wang Haiyang was not only these two things. Some farmers who were willing to plant chestnuts for a living had indeed planted high-quality seedlings and produced high-quality chestnuts. Therefore, people who didn't plant trees but went to the mountains to pick chestnuts especially liked to go to the high-quality chestnut orchard to pick chestnuts when the farmers were not there. Because of this, there was a fight. But it was just in time for a round of crackdown. Local ruffians and criminals saw the government with a big knife began to slaughter the bad guys. Under the strong pressure that they might lose their heads if they grabbed ten yuan, these people couldn't take care of themselves, so the competition for chestnuts stopped. Of course, there were also farmers who, in a rage, sued a group of villagers who robbed their chestnuts to the government. As a result, they became a thorn in the eyes of the village, and finally had to leave the village.
Wang Haiyang talked about what he saw. All the cadres of the ministries and commissions had grass-roots experience. Everyone found that the kinds of things they saw were not the same as Wang Haiyang. For example, Wang Haiyang had a deep impression of chestnuts, while the comrades from Jiangxi had a deep impression of citrus. With the current population and land area of the Min dynasty, it was more like a false proposition whether there was a lack of land.
After some discussion, they finally came to a conclusion. "Can state-controlled scale management be implemented in North America?" This was the proposal of a deputy minister of the Ministry of Agriculture from Jiangxi. In addition to the deer raising industry in Jiangxi, citrus planting was also very successful. The solution to the dispute among the people in Jiangxi was to invest a lot of money and manpower to make the citrus areas grow high-quality. This really meant that there was no shortage but inequality. Since everyone was planting high-quality varieties, the competition basically disappeared. Of course, the problem later became that it was not easy to sell such a large number of high-quality citrus. Even if the orange peel industry and the canning industry in Jiangxi were born, this problem still troubled the agricultural department of Jiangxi every year.
After some discussion, they finally came to a temporary conclusion. To fundamentally solve the problem of poverty and hunger, the best way was probably to let these people, who were originally far away from the industrial society, become a member of the industrial society and establish a close relationship with the industrial society.
These comrades with grassroots work experience were not very excited by this result. The difficulty and cost of doing this was much higher than sending grain to the countryside when there was a shortage of grain in these areas. Guangxi was a good example. Because the Min dynasty expanded rapidly in the South China Sea, a large number of Guangxi people moved to the South China Sea or to the city, resulting in a lot of empty land in Guangxi. The Guangxi government thought that it was good for everyone to move those people in the barren areas to the richer areas.
It was easy to imagine a good future, but when it came to actual implementation, it was not the case at all. The local natives who were close to the Han people did not have to spend too much effort to go down the mountain, but the natives who were not close to the Han people had limited interest. What was worse was that the natives' understanding of the government's invitation to go down the mountain was very different from the government's intention. The natives felt that the Han government gave them these lands.
This mountain was opened by me, and this tree was planted by me. This kind of thinking did not require a profound level of civilization to have. Later, there were many incidents of natives blocking the road, setting up roadblocks, or robbing passers-by. The local customs in Guangxi were tough, and the number of stubborn natives was very limited. The government took a heavy hand and sent a large number of soldiers up the mountain to capture them. After capturing them, they burned their mountain strongholds, destroyed their terrible fields, and forced these people to live on flat land at the foot of the mountain. They were forced to learn new production techniques, learn new languages, and learn new ways of life.
What was originally a good thing actually made the natives feel that they were suffering, and the government, who was trying to improve the living standards of the natives, also felt that it was very painful. So many people died in the whole operation, and so many innocent victims were produced. Everyone felt that they were more wronged than Dou E.
Later on, the Yunnan-Guizhou region learned from the failure of Guangxi, and only sent some food to the natives when they were short of food. Those who were willing to follow the government were naturally welcomed by the government, and given policies and a way out. Those who were not willing to follow the government, as long as they did not commit crimes, the government did not care about them. Of course, if the natives dared to come out and rob people, they would definitely be caught and shot to death. There was no mercy. With this kind of kindness and power, the natives were full of gratitude to the government.
From the perspective of solving the problem completely, turning the people into members of an industrial society was undoubtedly a temporary solution. From the perspective of practicality and cost, the cost of giving these people the freedom to choose over a long period of time was undoubtedly the lowest. As the top of the bureaucratic group, in the end, did they want to make achievements or save money? They had their own standpoints and could not reach a consensus.
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