"I have heard a little bit about it, but Your Majesty, why bother adding a new department? Just let a certain Qing official department work part-time."
Wang Yingxiong said helplessly. To establish a new department would require adding more officials, so why bother? Who in the Ministry of Households dislikes having little power?
"If you take on both roles, your powers and responsibilities are too light. This involves millions of people."
Zhu Yixi directly vetoed his proposal.
The Ministry of Household Affairs has a very wide scope of responsibility. It manages the country's finance, civil affairs, population and household registration, land and resources, underground mineral deposits, customs, taxation, auditing, etc. Together with the Commercial and Taxation Department, there are a total of fourteen Cleaning and Litigation Departments, which is one of the six departments.
most.
Each cleaning department is in charge of one province or several provinces and grains, so even though there are currently 24 provincial-level regions, they are still managed in an orderly manner. In addition, each cleaning department is also in charge of a nationwide project.
Specialized affairs.
For example, in addition to being in charge of Zhejiang's civil affairs, money and grain, the Zhejiang Division is also responsible for statistics on the national population and grain; the Yunnan Division is also in charge of water transportation of grain; the Guizhou Division is also in charge of currency customs; the Jiangxi Division is in charge of rates across the country; and the Guangxi Division is in charge of mining and coinage.
and the cashier of Neicang; the Fujian Department is also in charge of earthquake relief; the salaries of hundreds of officials, nobles, and clans are allocated to the Shaanxi Qing Li Department.
This saves official positions and allows one person to hold several positions, but the shortcomings are also obvious: powers and responsibilities are not separated, and government affairs are redundant.
Glancing at Wang Yingxiong, Zhu Yixi secretly thought, "There have been too many changes in the central government recently. When you retire, I will tear it to pieces."
"The Immigration Department will do this immediately."
The emperor's tone was unquestionable, and Wang Yingxiong had no choice but to comply, and the expenditure had to increase again.
He also knows that the immigration issue has reached a point where there is no need to delay.
In the Ministry of Household's autumn tax estimate, the addition of household registration is also being carried out one after another.
The population estimates of Shaanxi and Shanxi provinces have been released, and the situation is very serious. In the nine prefectures of Shaanxi, there are only less than 4 million people left, and they are concentrated in the Guanzhong Plain and Hanzhong Prefecture, Yulin, Yan'an, Qingyang, and Luochuan in northern Shaanxi.
The total number of houses was less than one million, but during the Wanli Tianqi period, it was about ten million.
Henan is the worst. It was beaten to pieces during the Chongzhen period. So far, there are only two million people. Tens of millions of people have been killed or injured and fled. More than two million people are in the four prefectures of Zhangde, Hebei. How miserable it is.
Nearly two decades of war, plague, and drought have seriously damaged the vitality of the north. In addition, the three newly established provinces of Gansu, Ningxia, and Suiyuan have lacked land reclamation in Dingkou.
If normal production is to be resumed, the household registration vacancy will be nearly 10 million.
Dingkou is prosperous in the three provinces of Jiangnan. It is estimated that the number exceeds 30 million. After internal discussion at the Ministry of Household Affairs, 40 million is no problem, especially in Jiangxi, where 20 million is not a problem.
There are also many hidden houses, which are even more difficult to estimate.
"Just south of the Yangtze River is enough to relocate five million landless people with little land."
Wang Yingxiong was filled with emotions. Only when he came to Hubu did he understand why the south was so important.
"Hunan fills in Hubei, Jiangxi fills in Henan, Zhejiang, Anhui, and Jiangsu. We collect five million and place them in Gansu, Suiyuan, and Shaanxi provinces as appropriate. Take your time. This is ten years of work."
"Your Majesty, there are so many people, and they need a huge amount of money and food. If we don't have more than ten years, the Ministry of Household Affairs will not have the money or food to arrange them."
Wang Yingxiong smiled bitterly.
"Start with short distances first. Hunan can be filled with Hubei, and Sichuan can be filled with Henan."
Zhu Yixi said in high spirits: "Every household that moves will be allocated fifty acres of land, exempt from tax for three years, half-tax for two years, and free of corvee for five years."
In the feudal dynasty, the greatest effort to reclaim wasteland was the three-year tax exemption, which sounded good but was actually very tricky to implement.
For example, if the imperial court issued a notice in the first month, it might have just begun autumn when they arrived, and the wasteland would have been reclaimed by this time, and the tax revenue would remain the same. Or, for a while, they could only pawn off the new land and make wedding clothes for others.
However, tax exemption does not avoid corvee work, which makes people run around without rest, and their families are destroyed and people are killed just for leisure.
Or put it another way, the word "official" is full of cannibalism.
Nowadays, the imperial court will publicize policies like this to benefit the people through public notices, and strictly regulate the start and end dates to prevent anyone from taking advantage of the opportunity to cause trouble.
"Hubu, we really have no money!"
Wang Yingxiong's butt determines his head, and he always said "no money", which is very different from his courage to do things when he was in the Ministry of Civil Affairs.
Even ordinary people can't help but feel distressed when they see the huge figures on the books dissipating little by little, let alone civil servants like them.
"No money? Didn't the salt tax increase by one million this year? If one household pays ten yuan, it will cost one hundred thousand households."
"Besides, according to the news from Jinyiwei, the price of food in Huguang and Sichuan has dropped to five silver cents per stone, which is only half of that in Beijing. How much money can an ordinary household spend?"
Wang Yingxiong was speechless and opened his mouth, but he didn't know what to say.
The emperor was very well prepared.
"Come on, I have something good to show you."
After saying this, the emperor became interested and called Wang Yingxiong, and together they went to a certain vegetable field.
On this land, some incomprehensible crops were planted.
"This is a sweet potato, also called a sweet potato."
Regardless of the soil, Zhu Yixi walked quickly and pulled at the seedlings. Several fist-sized red-skinned fruits appeared in front of Wang Yingxiong's eyes.
In this 17th century, sweet potatoes had not been improved. Not only were their yields low, but they were also small in size.
"Is this edible?"
“Eatable both raw and cooked!”
Zhu Yixi said excitedly: "I asked Xiyi to present this thing, and then the Chen family in Dongguan, Guangdong, and the Chen family in Changle, Fujian also presented this thing."
"It is said that this product does not choose the land, can be widely planted and tolerates barrenness, and can produce even on hillsides and ravines. It can yield more than 800 kilograms per acre, or more than a thousand kilograms, which is several times that of rice."
Wang Yingxiong was speechless. He looked at the sweet potato tuber in his hand and was speechless for a moment.
At this time, the emperor began to introduce the other side: "This is corn, which is also produced overseas. Its yield is also high, with a yield of hundreds of kilograms per mu. Compared with rice and wheat, it is easier to serve, but it requires more water."
"With these two types of food, why would it take three to five years? I'm afraid it would only be one and a half years, which would be enough for the immigrants to have enough food and clothing."
"His Majesty--"
Wang Yingxiong was amazed again and again, his eyes were wet: "With this kind of food, why worry about not having a prosperous age?"
"Since the Apocalypse, the people have been suffering day by day, the people have been in trouble, and the country has been humiliated. I just hope that the world will recover as soon as possible."
Zhu Yixi's words were serious and thoughtful, and her face was full of the image of a holy king.
"By the way, if we want to promote this kind of grain to the whole country, we need help from your Ministry of Household Affairs."
"We will do whatever we can to you."
"The Changping warehouses in each province must not only store rice and wheat, but also purchase sweet potatoes as much as possible."
“But these sweet potatoes are so big that they won’t survive forever!”
"You don't understand!" Zhu Yixi chuckled: "Wheat can be turned into flour, why can't sweet potatoes be ground into powder?"
Once Changpingcang in various provinces begins to purchase sweet potatoes, it will definitely promote the spread of sweet potatoes.
With the advantage of large quantities and adequate supply, sweet potatoes will quickly spread throughout the country, and with it, the difficulties of immigration can be reduced by half.