"Long live Lord, our Wuchang Prefecture has a lot of paddy fields and warm weather. It is much more luxurious than Xiangyang Prefecture. Moreover, half of the land in Wuchang Prefecture is in the hands of the children of the Chu State... All the true sects of our Chu State are Those who love Ming Dynasty but not Confucius know that the court is in trouble and there are disasters in the north, so they are willing to pay more taxes. The tax per mu in Xiangyang Prefecture is one six dou, and our Wuchang Prefecture is willing to pay two dou!"
The person who reported the results of the tax negotiation to Zhu Youjian in the Wuchang Imperial City was Zhu Rongxi, the Zongli of the Chu Mansion and King of Yong'an. He is the descendant of Zhu Mengjiong, the second son of Zhu Zhenshu, King of Chu Zhao, and was given the title of county king. He is the third person in the royal family of Chu, after the pseudo-King Chu and the pseudo-King Xuanhua. Now the pseudo-King of Chu and the pseudo-King of Xuanhua have both been expelled from the Jade Order and put on death row, waiting to be sentenced to death. If Chu Fan wants to renew his title, of course King Yong'an Zhu Rongxi is the most qualified to receive it.
However, the most qualified person does not have to wait for the title to be awarded, and it is hard to say whether Chu Fan can renew the title... Long live the Lord can say, it depends on performance!
Therefore, Yongan Wang Zhu Rongxi has been working very hard these days, and finally achieved good results of two buckets per acre!
In fact, he was also showing generosity to others... The largest landowner in Wuchang Prefecture was the Chu family, which was the result of continuous accumulation and expansion over two hundred years.
If Chu Fan cannot renew its seal in the end, or it will be kicked to the northwest like Shu Fan. Then all the Chu vassal land of more than one million acres in Wuchang belonged to Zhu Youjian. At that time, let alone two bushels per acre, you can still receive rent even if you rent eight bushels per acre.
If King Zhu Rongxi of Yong'an can get the power of the Chu vassal, these more than one million acres of land will be his! Even after deducting two bushels of land tax, there are still six bushels, and after deducting some rent collection costs, there are at least five bushels left... One million acres is half a million dan, and it all belongs to Zhu Rongxi !
"Two bushels per acre? Okay..." Zhu Youjian smiled so hard when he saw this number that he couldn't close his mouth. Of course he also knows how fertile the paddy fields in Wuchang Prefecture are!
As long as there are no floods, it will not be a problem to harvest three tons of rice a year... Widow Xu told Zhu Youjian that if such paddy fields are rented to large households, they can earn about eight tons of rent a year. However, Zhu Youjian's hands were not long enough, and his control over Huguang was ultimately limited. There is no guarantee that these more than one million acres of paddy fields will always receive relatively high rents.
In addition, what these more than one million acres of paddy fields can receive is only 700,000 to 800,000 dan (without tax deduction), but what Zhu Youjian wants to get from Huguang is 20 million dan per year!
Therefore, after careful consideration, Zhu Youjian decided to renew the Chu vassal title and make it his agent in Huguang - Huguang has such a large territory and so many clans, it is not feasible to have only one Xiang Wang Zhu Yiming acting as an agent to control the clan. It is easy for Xiangfan to grow.
So I have to support one or two more agents!
Zhu Youjian looked at the fat Zhu Rongxi in front of him. The more he looked at him, the more he felt like his grandfather... He looked similar, and he loved Ming Dynasty so much. He must be a "true prince".
"King Yong'an," Zhu Youjian said with a smile, "I will ask you a few more questions. If you answer them well, I will decree to make you the King of Chu."
"Excuse me, Your Majesty," King Yong'an Zhu Rongxi tried hard to suppress the excitement in his heart, "I should tell you everything I know, and I will tell you everything I want to say."
"Grain production in the north is severely reduced now," Zhu Youjian frowned, "Many prefectures and counties in Shaanxi have lost their harvests due to floods. Floods have crossed the eastern part of Henan Province and Huaibei in northern Zhili, and dozens of counties have lost their harvests. ..... Since I became emperor, disasters have occurred in the northern provinces one after another, and they are getting more and more serious. However, food is the most important thing for the people, and people who have no food must rebel!
Although I can collect several times more taxes on my southern tour of Huguang this time...but the food supply in Huguang won't be 20 million shi more just because I'm here, right? If I save these 20 million stones of grain, will there be a gap in the food supply in Huguang? Will food prices rise sharply? Will there be famine in the Southeast and Central Plains?
King Yong'an, I know that your family has been selling grain and rice for several generations and is familiar with the market, but you must tell me the truth! "
Are these questions too difficult?
King Yong'an Zhu Rongxi was just half happy when his mood plummeted!
"Long live my lord... you want to save all 20 million stones of grain? Why?" King Yong'an Zhu Rongxi didn't quite understand, "This year has been a year of disaster. We should open a warehouse in this year of disaster!"
"Because the disaster may be even greater in the future!" Zhu Youjian said, "Now the country has no food to fight the famine, and the warehouse mainly stores silver. There is no food storage. Once a big disaster comes, how to prevent it? "
The results of begging for food in Huguang are good, but relying on the emperor to beg for food cannot completely solve the future food shortage.
Because after all, food is grown, not produced!
Therefore, it is very difficult for Zhu Youjian to save 100 million shi of food before the disaster, because in the years before the catastrophe, there were disasters every year, and the food supply was still tight, and he had to save 2,000 shi a year. Ten thousand stones means that there is a shortage of 20 million stones in the market!
If the gap cannot be filled, people will starve to death, and it will also cause civil unrest!
"This..." King Zhu Rongxi of Yong'an thought hard, "Long live my lord, it is not easy to increase grain production! Although the land in Huguang is not exhausted, if the price of grain rises a little, the grain merchants will give more deposits. It can encourage farmers to plant more crops.”
"Approximately how much production can be increased?" Zhu You asked.
Yong'an King Zhu Rongxi frowned, "This...it's hard to say. After all, farming depends on the weather. All farmers can do is to sow more seeds and plant drought-tolerant crops on all the previously uncultivated slopes." Crops. If the weather goes well, we can make up for the 20 million stone gap."
"Drought-tolerant crops? Are they sweet potatoes, taro and potatoes?" Zhu Youjian quickly asked.
"There is also wheat..." King Yong'an said, "Huguang is rainy, and even sloping land can be cultivated to grow wheat... but the yield is not very high." He paused, "If Long Live Lord I am really worried about the lack of food in the future, but I have a solution."
"Speak, speak quickly!"
King Yong'an considered it and said: "I suggest that Long live Lord sell part of the rice, and then buy sweet potatoes and potatoes from Huguang, Nanzhili, Jiangxi, Fujian, Zhejiang, Guangdong and other provinces, and then use them to provide relief to the victims in the north or store them. According to As I know, sweet potatoes and potatoes are resistant to drought and barrenness, and can be grown on mountain slopes in the south. However, they are not very tasty and not many people buy them, so not many are grown."
In this era, sweet potatoes and potatoes have not yet been improved and selected, and their yields are not particularly high. It is not profitable to use them to replace traditional rice and wheat, and farmers will not be so obedient to orders.
Therefore, the most feasible way is to sell rice and purchase potatoes through grain merchants to increase their prices.
In recent years, due to successive disasters in the north, food prices have been relatively high. As long as part of the 2,000 kilograms of rice harvested every year is sold, a large amount of sweet potatoes and potatoes can be purchased, which can be used to relieve the victims and at the same time promote the production of sweet potatoes in the south. The cultivation of potatoes and potatoes gradually formed a large scale.
"This method is not bad," Zhu Youjian nodded, "Is there any other method?"
"Other ways..." King Yong'an Zhu Rongxi tried his best to use his brain again, and he actually came up with an idea for him, "Long live Lord, you have to ask for food from the Huaihe River! 20 million stones of rice, there are 15 million in the Huaihe River An acre of fertile farmland is enough. But once the floods of the Huaihe River and the Yellow River subside, several times the land will be reduced to ze country. I heard people say that there is a lot of abandoned land on both sides of the Huaihe River, perhaps millions of acres! If it can all be turned into fertile farmland, This will greatly alleviate the disasters in the north."
Huaihe River...Zhu Youjian took a breath, walked around for a long time, and returned to the Huaihe River!
Huguang's success in begging for food actually improved the finances of the Ming Dynasty - it suddenly gained 18 million yuan in income. Ming Dynasty had never been so rich!
However, the overall food supply did not increase significantly. Even if Yongan Wang’s method can be used to produce more sweet potatoes and potatoes, it is hard to say whether it will be enough.
It seems that the best way is to turn the land submerged by the Huaihe and Yellow Rivers back into fertile farmland!
And to achieve this goal...the Grand Canal must be interrupted!
But there are millions of people who rely on the canal for food!
Another million beggars!
