Volume 3: Confrontation! The Run of Civilization Chapter 448: Development of Overseas States (II)
"Last month, 7,000 mu of idle land in our state was rented out to lessors from Guangdong and Fujian for rubber planting. The lease contract states that no tax or rent will be calculated for the and before March next year. The rent will only start to be calculated when all the rubber seeds provided by our state of Singapore are in place in March next year. Five years later, when the rubber plantation produces rubber, tax will start to be calculated. The land rental fee is five silver cents per mu."
"Hey~"
After Li Jia finished saying this, the remaining four people sighed softly.
No matter how special the status of Singapore State is and how important its strategic location is, in traditional Chinese culture, it is still a more remote place than the former Yazhou. It is not so bad for Fangshan students like Li Jia, but for people like Qu Shisi and Huang Zunsu, their families suffered great pressure in their hometowns because of their appointments here: in the eyes of neighbors, taking up a post in an overseas state is equivalent to exile!
Therefore, Qu Shisi and Huang Zunsu here are trying their best to make some achievements so that they can be transferred back to their homeland. Even Li Jia and the other three, although they are the most loyal subjects of Zhu Youdong, they did not expect to be picky about their positions. But since they have entered the officialdom, who would not want to climb up? Not to mention, as Fangshan students continue to participate in the imperial examinations, more and more people have entered the officialdom. In addition to being united when facing officials outside the school, these alumni are inevitably comparing and competing with each other.
All these require them to make political achievements in Singapore!
However, it is not easy to achieve political achievements.
Singapore was very developed in later generations, mainly relying on finance, electronics, petrochemicals, shipping and service industries. In this era, if the state of Singapore wanted to develop, it first needed to absorb population, and then it would have the spare capacity to develop shipping and port services.
To absorb population, nothing is easier than developing a plantation economy. It should be noted that in this life, in addition to the current Singapore Island with a radius of more than 600 square kilometers, Zhu Youdong also crossed the Johor Strait and cut off more than 20,000 square kilometers of the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula. In other words, in this era, Singapore, in addition to not having to worry about fresh water resources being controlled by others, also has a huge amount of available land.
However, no matter how large the land is, it is useless if it is not fully utilized.
"Everyone, there are only about 20,000 Han people in this state, including the army and their families. Although we have introduced many preferential measures to attract the surrounding natives to settle here, we cannot resist the other four states, as well as the two vassal states of Zhou and Tang, which are also vigorously absorbing population. Moreover, in addition to being the southernmost of the five states, the surrounding tribes are also the most rebellious to the king. Besides, we want to build this place into the permanent inherent territory of our China, how can the proportion of Han people be low? Therefore, in addition to continuing to increase efforts to attract domestic businessmen to invest and lease land, we must also find ways to attract more people, especially Han people to settle here!"
Is there anything wrong with what Li Jia said? Of course there is. But it is too difficult to put it into practice.
What industries does Singapore have now? Agriculture is still good. In the 21st century, Singapore has a population of 5-6 million people living in an area of 600-700 square kilometers, so there is certainly not enough fresh water. But now the island's fresh water is more than enough to support more than 20,000 permanent residents. Therefore, under the development of the hardworking Han people, the output of rice, vegetables, and especially tropical fruits is quite good.
However, no matter how well the agricultural development is, it can basically play no role except to meet the needs of local residents: the conditions for food preservation and storage are limited these days, and tropical fruits cannot be transported and exported in the form of fresh fruits. Even if they are pickled into preserved fruits, due to the distance, they have no price advantage compared with the Taiwan Prefecture headed by Sun Chuanting, so they cannot enter the local market of the Ming Dynasty at all. As for food? There are more than 20,000 permanent residents, and there are a large number of soldiers and their families, so at most 7,000 people can be allocated for agricultural production: no matter how these people work, the total amount of food produced is limited. In addition to being self-sufficient, very few can be exported to earn foreign exchange.
In addition to local agriculture, Singapore also has some fisheries, but there are still problems such as limited manpower, low output, and lack of sales. After these two, the state government's income mainly comes from land leasing and port services.
The former had to compete with the other four states under the Central and Southern Governor's Office for land leasing. Especially under the premise that the officials of the five states were working hard to attract investment, everyone kept the land leasing rent extremely low. Later, in order to limit this vicious internal competition, Xiong Tingbi had to summon the governors of the five states to unify the pricing: the rent per mu should not be less than three silver coins per year.
As for why the land lease in Singapore State recently reached five silver cents per acre, it was of course because Li Jia made great concessions on the time of collecting rent and taxes.
But from Li Jia's perspective: As long as you can rent the land, it doesn't matter even if it doesn't generate income for me for the time being. Because, if you have a manor, you have to get workers. When workers come, they will consume, right? With consumption, more people can be attracted. In this way, the whole of Singapore can develop rapidly.
In short, the funds that land and agriculture can currently provide to the Singapore state government are very limited. In addition to meeting food needs, the salaries of public servants such as officials, teachers, and soldiers are basically paid from port services.
As the Ming Dynasty's directly governed territory farthest from Beijing in terms of latitude, Singapore has its own disadvantages. However, it has its own unique advantages in shipping. After the entire East Asia was brought under the control of the Ming Dynasty, the export of silk, porcelain and tea in the Ming Dynasty has experienced a blowout. There are at least ten merchant ships passing through Singapore Port every day, and sometimes even more than a hundred.
With so many ships, most of them will choose to stop in Singapore. The sailors on the ship buy some fresh fruits and vegetables, and replenish fresh water, which is just a small amount of money. The real big money comes from the ship maintenance provided by the port, the rest and relaxation of the crew, and the delivery of materials.
Ship repair requires a large dock, but there are only four docks in Singapore Port, and three of them are relatively small. As a result, many merchant ships dare not choose Singapore Port when they need repairs - it takes too much time. Then Yangon, Bangkok and other cities are desperately building repair docks...
It’s not that Singapore has not noticed these problems, but there are only so many people in the entire state, and digging water holes also requires manpower!
As for the crew's relaxation and rest, to put it bluntly, the port will set up restaurants, gambling houses, and brothels. Although these are profitable, they are still labor-intensive industries and still require people.
As for the delivery of materials, it is actually to build a large number of warehouses at the port. Then Arabs, Indians and even Spaniards can transport goods here and drop them off, and Chinese merchants can come here to pick up the goods directly. And vice versa. In this way, both sides can save voyages and greatly reduce costs.
But as I said, it takes people to build a warehouse, and it takes people to look after the warehouse.
According to Zhu Youdong's strict order, the army was forbidden to engage in business. Therefore, although Singapore State had sent people everywhere in the past two years, Du Youning did not dare to ask his garrison troops to help: if Qu Shisi reported it, no one would be able to protect him.
"Everyone, after nearly two years of turmoil, everyone knows what our state is most in need of right now. It's short of people! Therefore, our state's top priority now is to get enough people from somewhere!"
"What the governor said is correct, but how do we get someone to come?"
"I think we should do it in several steps. The first is to continue to give 100 acres of land free of charge to those who insist on settling in Singapore for more than three years, so as to attract farmers with little or no land in China. The second is to further reduce local taxes in disguise . As long as big businessmen are willing to invest, they will automatically bring people here. The third is that I would like to ask An Zhi (Du Youning) to go to Luzon."
"Luzon?"
"Yes, Luzon. Although this place is now occupied by the Spaniards, there are many Han Chinese there. Humph, I have come to understand in the past two years that the natives around here are basically lazy and stupid. If we really want to do a good job, we have to rely on our own people. You should find a way to go there and recruit some people. Singapore has an excellent geographical location and prosperous trade. Those people from Luzon who come here, whether they are farming or doing business, have plenty of opportunities to get rich."
"Hiss~" Du Youning let out a long sigh: "Prefect, it's okay to do this secretly, but if we really do it on a large scale, I'm afraid it will cause interference from the Spanish. Before the emperor decides to take action against Luzon, we..."
"Hmph, I don't care. Now we are competing with the other four states in development. In fact, it is a competition to see who can attract population faster! The other four states have the mainland behind them, and the base of local indigenous people is much larger than our isolated island. Even the Kinh, Khmer, Burmese and even Thai people are much more reliable than the Malays nearby in terms of obedience and diligence. If we don't take special measures, when the other four states gather enough population, form a complete industry, and attract all the merchants to them, we will be finished! Therefore, we must find a way to attract people from Luzon! If anything happens, I will take responsibility!"
