There is a huge difference between the grain trade monopoly policy in the New Dynasty era and the grain trade monopoly policy in the feudal era.
The previous vassal towns' comprehensive control of grain trade seemed to stabilize people's livelihood, but in fact it was all for the previous vassal towns to better exploit farmers to maintain the war.
A peasant family with hundreds of acres of land can barely eat enough even when there is a bumper harvest. The clothes they wear are full of patches, and their children cannot receive an education. This situation was unprecedented in the past or in other countries.
It is unimaginable, but now it has become a reality in Daheng.
Decades ago and even hundreds of years ago, Daheng farmers were actually synonymous with the middle class and developed an extremely special Daheng rural economic system!
But now, farmers have become synonymous with poverty in Daheng.
This is because the grain harvested by the farmers was uniformly purchased by the feudal towns at very low prices, and then they were forced to purchase high-priced grain seeds, fertilizers, farm tools, etc. provided by the feudal towns. Most of the remaining money had to pay high taxes.
, after changing hands like this, there was not much money left in my hand.
This completely destroyed the rural economic system that Daheng people were proud of and had lasted for nearly hundreds of years.
There are gains and losses. It is precisely because the rural economic system has been completely destroyed, the income of many small and medium-sized farmers has been reduced, and even they have lost their land after bankruptcy, which has forced a large number of rural laborers to work in cities.
A large number of laborers are pouring into cities, which can provide sufficient labor for industry and commerce and accelerate urbanization.
If it were not for the bankruptcy of the rural economy, Daheng would not be able to develop a large number of backward but large-scale industries.
The top leaders of the empire are also discussing reforming the rural economy, trying to find a good reform plan that can not only protect the livelihood of farmers, but also not suppress the development of the empire's industry.
The Daheng Empire has too many small and medium-sized farmers. If they are not severely oppressed, they can live a very good life relying on farming. There is no need to work hard in factories in the city.
But without a sufficient number of workers, industry cannot develop.
In this regard, relevant officials of the Lin Dynasty must find a proper plan.
It is necessary to ensure the stability of the grain industry and the interests of farmers, as well as the sustainable development of industry.
Until a more secure solution is found, the Lin Dynasty will not change the existing policies, namely the tax restriction order and the grain trade monopoly policy.
The tax restriction order policy can be said to be the foundation of the Lin Dynasty. According to the many tax reduction policies in the tax restriction order, whether it is small and medium-sized farmers in the countryside, ordinary citizen workers in the city, or businessmen, middle- and high-income earners,
Even the rich and powerful have been able to obtain a large amount of benefits from the tax restriction order.
This is also the reason why Lin Ziran issued a tax restriction order that year and was able to gain widespread support from all walks of life.
With extensive support, Lin Ziran was able to quickly mobilize a large amount of manpower and material resources, and then unified Nanhai Prefecture and developed it to the current situation.
The tax restriction order provided real benefits to all sectors of society. For this reason, the Lin Dynasty was also under heavy financial pressure and issued a large amount of national debt in order to maintain the war of unification.
The benefits to farmers of some of the agricultural tax provisions in the tax restriction order are very intuitive and visible. The tax rate can be directly lowered in one fell swoop, reducing the burden on small and medium-sized farmers, allowing them to earn more income.
At the same time, the grain trade monopoly policy implemented by the new dynasty is not the same as that of the original vassal towns. It is just to lower grain prices and exploit more farmers to produce surplus value.
The core purpose of the New Dynasty's grain trade monopoly policy is to stabilize grain prices and avoid excessive fluctuations in grain prices that would harm the interests of farmers. In addition, it is also to unify the control of grain export trade and avoid internal strife that leads to international grain trade prices being too low.
, thereby endangering the enemy.
However, although Lin Ziran does not want to export food, there is still no way to stop the export of food in a short time, because it involves more than 100 million farmers. The farmers in Daheng grow food not only for their own food, but also for sale.
Lose grain and exchange it for money to pay taxes, purchase grain, farm horses, farm tools, clothing and other expenses.
Therefore, food exports cannot be stopped without any reason.
It is necessary to adjust the price difference in international trade of grain, and at the same time guide farmers to start planting other types of economic crops, expand the income of urban residents, and increase their consumption of aquatic products. Only through a multi-pronged approach can we effectively control the large-scale export of grain.
, to avoid capitalizing on the enemy.
The current relationship between agriculture and industry and commerce in the Daheng Empire is contradictory and complicated. In addition, the agriculture of the Daheng Empire mainly produces grain and exports a large amount of surplus grain, which creates even more problems.
This complicated situation was caused by the civil strife in Daheng that lasted for decades, but now that the new dynasty has been established, the unification war has entered a critical period, and complete unification is expected. At this time, Lin Ziran has to consider adjusting the empire.
The contradiction between agriculture and industry and commerce as well as the problem of cheap export of large amounts of food have been eliminated.
The train continued to go north, and Lin Ziran thought for a long time amid the clanging sound. Before the train arrived at the Jingshi Railway Station, Lin Ziran had already finalized the general idea.
That is, regardless of other messy things, promoting technological development is the last word.
We need to build steam tractors now, and later we can build internal combustion engine tractors to promote mechanized farming.
We will further develop the chemical industry and develop and promote chemical fertilizers.
Research on improving crops and increasing yields.
Through a series of technological developments, the current contradiction between agriculture and industry will be alleviated and let them promote each other and develop together.
Judging from the current complex and even contradictory industrial structure in the Daheng Empire, it is impossible to adjust simply by relying on some policies.
For example, the conflict between agriculture and industry and commerce.
Its root lies in labor force!
Agriculture requires a large amount of labor, and industry also requires a large amount of labor. Lin Ziran believes that the best way is to continue to promote the modern farming model.
For the Daheng Empire, which has a large amount of arable land, even if horse farming is used, the amount of land that each labor force can cultivate is still limited. To put it bluntly, even if all Daheng people go to farm, Daheng’s can
The cultivated land can accommodate all of it, and there is even excess cultivated land.
In many places in Daheng, there is actually a lot of undeveloped land. Going deep into the inland areas, especially in places with inconvenient transportation, you can see large areas of undeveloped plains.
It’s not that Daheng people are not diligent enough to leave this land undeveloped, but Daheng has too much arable land. It is just the traditional territory of Daheng people, that is, Jingzhou, Pingnan Prefecture, Dongding Prefecture, and Zisheng Prefecture.
The six states, Nanhai Prefecture and Quyang Prefecture, have a large amount of arable land, and the land is very fertile. The arable land resources in these six states alone are enough to feed hundreds of millions of people.
In Lin Ziran's view, if the arable land resources in these six states are fully developed, supplemented with chemical fertilizers and improved grain varieties, there will be no problem in feeding one billion people.
If further development is carried out, the arable land in these six states can support at least one billion people!
There is so much arable land, and almost all of it is plain terrain. As for the terraced fields in the hills, in the eyes of the Daheng people, they are not arable land at all.
Such terrain can further promote mechanized farming to liberate more rural laborers, allowing them to work in cities and contribute to industrial development.
In the future, the chemical fertilizer industry can be developed to increase the yield per acre, which will further increase agricultural output value and increase farmers' income.
Through the development of technology, the contradiction between industry and industry can be alleviated, and the two can even promote the development of each other, while promoting the development of agriculture and industry.