() Since industry and chemical industry require a large amount of investment in machinery, equipment and manpower, Taiwan's mechanical equipment output is far from being able to meet this large-scale investment. However, the gap in Taiwan's industrial population is not very large. This is mainly because
This is attributed to the speed of Taiwan’s agricultural development.
Ever since the floods occurred in Changhua in 1898, Liu Fu has started to control Taiwan's water conservancy, and has not let up for more than ten years. Large and small reservoirs and irrigation facilities have basically spread all over Taitung, Taichung and Tainan, which are the main crops.
The production areas not only provide reasonable watering for crops, but also play a role in curbing flash floods during the rainy season every year. Since 1905, there have been basically no large-scale floods in Taiwan.
The research and development and production of organic pesticides and chemical fertilizers have greatly increased the unit yield of crops in Taiwan, allowing Taiwan to have bumper harvests of food and cash crops year after year. A bumper harvest is actually a good thing, but due to the continuous bumper harvests, the price of food has dropped year after year.
The number of farmers farming began to gradually decrease, especially in those years.
Young farmers are more energetic. These people gave up their farmland and went to several industrial cities in Taipei, Keelung, Taichung and Tainan in droves to join steel manufacturing plants, sugar mills, and camphor processing.
Factories, shipyards and other factories have become the pioneers in the transformation of the agricultural population into the industrial population.
With an industrial population, Taiwan still needs a lot of machinery and equipment. Liu Fu could not make these, but they can buy them. Starting from 1907, capitalist countries represented by the United States began to experience economic crises, some mild, some
is a bit more serious, and the United States is considered the hardest hit area.
In early 1907, Liu Fu received several telegrams from David and Schneider. The telegrams specifically mentioned an important matter, that is, some bankers in the United States were plotting a banking revolution to prompt the United States to establish its own state-owned bank.
zhong yang bank instead of the current private zhong yang bank, they planned to use a financial crisis to shock American society. The facts show that a country without zhong yang bank
Yang Bank's society is so "fragile". In addition, these bankers are not early philanthropists without profit. They plan to use this financial crisis to squeeze out and merge their small and medium-sized competitors, especially those they cannot control.
trust investment companies and some companies they have coveted for a long time but cannot get involved in.
Since these bankers have more or less business dealings with Sandro Electric and Schneider Oil Company, especially Schneider's oil company, his partners are Chrysler and the Morgan family, so this news was reported by David and Schneider
I knew it in advance and informed Liu Fu.
When Liu Fu received the news, he didn't think of anything else except the various evils of investment banks in later generations. He just told David and Schneider to follow the footsteps of the Chrysler and Morgan families.
You don’t have to do the things they don’t do, but you must not do the things they don’t do.
A few months later, at the end of the year, David sent another telegram, saying that the third largest trust company in the United States, "Knickerbocker", was about to go bankrupt. In order to cope with the run on savers, they borrowed money from the stock market, and
Due to lax government supervision, about half of the bank loans in New York are used as collateral by trust companies and invested in high-risk stock markets and bonds. If the stock market cannot raise enough positions, then the stock market will have to be closed.
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Liu Fu didn't know much about stocks, bonds, trusts, etc. He had never played with these things in his previous life, so he didn't understand the meaning of what David told him about these things. If an American trust company went bankrupt, it would go bankrupt, and
Is it related to Taiwan?
After several telegrams with David, Liu Fu understood that David was worried that the financial crisis would affect the development of Sandro Electric Company and Schneider Oil Company. Because at that time, banks across the United States were affected, and many banks were affected.
Companies that could not borrow loans began to close down. According to David, the West Coast was not even the center of the storm. San Francisco had already closed down more than 10 railroad companies and 3 steel companies in 1907, and some shipping companies were also struggling.
middle.
At that time, Liu Fu was planning to transform Taiwan into industrialization and was worried about not having enough machinery and equipment. When he heard the word bankruptcy, his pupils immediately turned into square shapes. After asking about the general situation of these bankrupt companies, Liu Fu
Immediately entrust David to purchase a large amount of machinery and equipment from these bankrupt companies in the United States. The specific purchase list and purchase quantity will be made by the Taiwan government department and will be sent to David in a few days.
A few days later, not only did David receive the dozen-page list transmitted by telegram, but Schneider also received one. The types and quantities of the lists on both sides were different, and they were basically all Taiwan’s projects in the next few years.
Something needed.
Originally, Liu Fu planned to purchase some machinery and equipment at a cheap price, but who would have thought that David and Schneider would use their company's relationship to not only launch a bankruptcy liquidation in the United States, but also extend their tentacles to Europe. This time, by
The financial turmoil triggered by American exchanges not only swept the United States, but also spread to Europe. According to later reports,
According to recent statistics, between 1907 and 1908, more than 40 railroad companies went bankrupt in the United States alone. In the second half of 1907, steel production dropped by 60%, pig iron production dropped by 40%, construction contracts dropped by 23%, and steel trusts
More than half of its subordinate enterprises have stopped working, and countless workers have lost their jobs.
Europe, which is far away, is not much better. Steel production in major industrial countries such as Britain, France, and Germany has dropped by more than 15% on average, ferrous metal consumption has dropped by 20%, and the tonnage of new ships has dropped by 40%.
, the export volume of the textile industry decreased by more than 30%.
Under such circumstances, David and Schneider, who were well aware of Taiwan's family background, not only collected machinery and equipment from various bankrupt companies in Europe and the United States with their checkbooks held high, but also took matters into their own hands and helped Taiwan hire a group of high-quality and low-cost technical personnel.
and skilled workers, together with the equipment, arrived in Taiwan in batches.
At that time, Taiwan's government was not yet ready for industrial transformation. Facing batch after batch of machinery, equipment and personnel, the former could only be sealed and the latter arranged to various state-owned factories and Sandro and Schneider.
, keep it temporarily.
After more than a year of planning, these equipment and personnel can finally be put to use. As the Taiwan government has announced batches of corporate projects supported by the government, those who rely on sugar processing on the island, especially in the central and southern parts of Taiwan,
The landlord class who started out in camphor processing rushed to the local government with their funds.
fu, to subscribe for industrial projects and cheap second-hand equipment that can be operated by the private sector, bring them back to the land that has been prepared for a long time near their hometown, build factories at rocket speed, and then build factories from several large cities on the island of Taiwan.
We bought raw materials from the industrial zone and started trial production.
Unemployed workers and technicians from European and American countries hired by Taiwan's government are then rehired by the government to these small and medium-sized private enterprises at the original price to guide them in mastering the use of these machines and equipment in a short period of time and train themselves
industrial workers.
More and more factories are being built and put into operation across Taiwan, and the number of people applying to build factories and purchase projects is also increasing. Suddenly, Taiwan, which was originally peaceful, begins to be turbulent, and it may change from an agricultural economy to an industrial one overnight.
The trend of becoming a powerful country.
Liu Fu is well aware of the Chinese people's tendency to follow the crowd, and is afraid that a good thing will turn into a bad thing due to improper handling and lack of timely guidance, so he has already made preparations for the other side while releasing the project, which is caused by
The government provides various support policies and preferential policies to agriculture to ensure a certain number of agricultural people, lest all the people open factories and no one goes to farm.
This is the case for ordinary people. When he feels that opening a factory can make money, he will open a factory. When he feels that farming is also good, he will stay in his original home and continue farming. As long as he can bring in industrial income.
If the adjustment is within a range close to that of agricultural income, there will be no rush-like impulse, and most people will not easily give up their familiar fields and venture into an unfamiliar environment because of a little surprise.
Since the Taiwanese government made these preparations in advance under Liu Fu's reminder, the industrial transfer across Taiwan did not cause much harm to agriculture. In the future, as competition becomes more intense, there will still be some hot-headed people.
