The opponent of Jinghua Trading Company is at sea.
It has been nearly eight years since Gao Jingshi built the Tianjin Private Port in the late years of Longqing. During these eight years, Gao Jingshi once again let the world see the magic of the Midas Touch more than once.
First, the rise of Tianjin Port is jaw-dropping. Originally, according to what others thought, the so-called parallelization of water and sea transport was nothing more than transferring some tasks that could not be completed by water transport to the sea. Water transport was originally a loss-making business, so sea transport should also be unprofitable.
Is water transport a loss-making business? It must be, Gao Pragmatic knows this very well. In his previous life, he had read several monographs on water transportation in the Ming Dynasty. They all believed that water transportation was definitely a loss-making business, and there were detailed data to support it.
In fact, water transportation in the Ming Dynasty was not a profitable enterprise in itself, and the Ming court never regarded the cost issue as a major issue.
For example, as far as grain is concerned, despite the high cost of transportation, the imperial court still sells grain on the market in the capital at a price lower than the initial price from time to time. Is this a cost consideration? Obviously not. This is a matter of consideration from the perspective of stable governance in the Gyeonggi region.
The consumption of labor, especially the labor consumption of maintaining the Cao River channel, is often not considered by the water transport authorities. In fact, while the whole country was doing its best to transport grain to the north, private traders were transporting grain to the south in the Huaihe and Huguang areas.
What impressed Gao pragmatism most about the water transport issue was a monograph that said: “In 1632, the Minister of Household Affairs reported to the Ming Dynasty that a large number of taxes paid in kind had not yet been collected, including the taxes paid by Suzhou on the list. Honey, its value is less than 280,000 taels of silver. This petition was submitted when the national tax arrears exceeded 170,000 taels of silver.
In addition, coin circulation channels can also reflect the lack of systematic management. In 1592, Wanping County under Beijing delivered 27 military stations and institutions specified by the central government, some of which were located on the Great Wall. However, all the items were worth less than 2 taels of silver, some of them were worth less than 5 taels, and some were even only one or two taels. We are not surprised by this. Regarding the management of the Cao River, Ming Dynasty bureaucrats also set up many costly and wasteful procedures. "
The Cao River, also known as the Grand Canal, is a man-made river. Its operating efficiency is not only closely related to the sand content of the Yellow River, the water level of Gaoyou Lake and the freezing season in North China, but also, to a considerable extent, depends on the people of the time. opinions and responses to various issues.
The Caohe River occupies a prominent position and has always been the only trunk line for transportation to the capital. What is the main reason? What is the quantity and variety of items transported on the Cao River? How to manage Caohe River? How to avoid losing money?
Gao Pragmatic knew very well that what really determined this series of issues was not the natural environment, but the ideological concepts that dominated the court.
But Gao Pragmatic can't solve this problem for the time being, not to mention that he is just a civil servant now, even if he becomes an assistant now. To solve this problem, he not only needs to be an assistant, but also needs the full support of the emperor. He also needs to have a lot of disciples, former officials, political allies, and even a high reputation among scholars. Otherwise, he will not be able to deal with the government and the public. of opposition.
Therefore, he could only avoid the most important and transfer part of the water transport function to the sea. This was only possible with Gao Gong, the third uncle who supported the opening of the sea.
However, after transferring this part of the water transport function, can Tianjin Port be reached? Of course not.
If it only relies on this part of the seaborne grain transit business, the highly pragmatic Tianjin Private Port can at best guarantee that it will not starve itself to death, but it will definitely not be enough to achieve success. Therefore, Gao Pragmatic prepared a supporting method early on, which was to attract investment.
Of course, it is not about attracting investment to build factories in Tianjin, but by improving the facilities of Tianjin Port to attract more southern businessmen to sell goods to the capital and to the entire north by sea! At the same time, goods from the north were transported back to the south through Tianjin Port for sale. Only by forming this thriving north-south trade boom can he, as the owner of Tianjin Port, make sufficient profits from it.
At the same time, Gao Pragmatic was not limited to the port itself. After Tianjin Port began to make profits, he began to target more excellent ports and also began to build his own shipyard.
He still followed the old routine, which was to purchase wasteland in advance to build new ports in the Bohai Rim area. The new ports that have been built so far include Yingkou Port at the mouth of the Liaohe River in Liaodong, which Gao Pragmatic changed its name for convenience, Tangshan Port near the Luanhe River mouth, Laizhou Port in northern Shandong, and Jiaozhou Port in southeastern Shandong. Qingdao.
Among them, Tianjin Port, Tangshan Port, Yingkou Port and Laizhou Port are the four pillar ports of his "Bohai Rim Business Circle" plan.
Because Tianjin Port is backed by the capital, its core position is certain, so it is also the largest in scale. The main significance of Tangshan Port is to transport products from the three major factories in Kaiping, both for civilian and military purposes. However, because the goods are relatively single, the market is still limited. The size of this port is currently the smallest. Laizhou Port is mainly responsible for the transfer station for buying and selling goods to Shandong, because the current economic and population core of Shandong is mainly in the Jinan area, and Laizhou is relatively close. As for Jiaozhou Port, it is actually mainly It is an "anchorage" for Gao pragmatic's southward expansion. Its commercial value itself is relatively limited, but it also has another important task, which is to become Gao pragmatic's first shipbuilding base.
The geographical advantage of Qingdao Port is naturally unparalleled. In addition to being a natural deep-water port with various natural conditions for shelter from wind and waves, it also has the advantage of being located not far from North China to the north and Jiangnan not far to the south.
Gao pragmatically decided to set the first shipbuilding base here because he hoped to build an all-round shipbuilding base here that could produce flat-bottomed sand ships suitable for the Bohai Sea and sharp-bottomed sea-going ships suitable for the East China Sea and even the Southeast Asia. After all, he was doing " "Private enterprises" must consider the cost issue, and it is of course the best to be able to use one place for multiple purposes.
After the completion of these major ports, the Bohai Rim business circle has actually laid a good foundation.
Nowadays, leather goods, Dongzhu, wild ginseng, and other items from Liaodong can be easily transported to Yingkou through the Liaohe River, and then exported from Yingkou to Tianjin and then transferred to the south.
Silk, porcelain, cotton cloth and even grain from the south can also be shipped directly to northern ports to meet the needs of Northern Zhili, Shandong, Liaodong and other places.
The iron products and cement produced by the three major factories in Kaiping can also meet the needs of various parts of the north and even the south of the Yangtze River through Tangshan Port.
In such a revitalized port circle, Gao Pragmatic can make a lot of money just from the berthing fees, not to mention the rental of many warehouses and storefronts within the port, all of which are good businesses with huge profits.
Especially when Gao Pragmatic unified these businesses under the name of "Jinghua Sea Trading", Jinghua Trading Co., Ltd. naturally could not stand out!
