Volume 3: Confrontation! The Run of Civilization Chapter 504: Build Roads First if You Want to Be Rich
On the 18th day of the first lunar month in the fourth year of the Tianqi reign, the State Council held a meeting.
In the first half of the meeting, everyone discussed the routine matters. The only controversial issue that took up some time was the rewards for the Luzon Campaign: the opinion submitted by the Privy Council was that both Li Guozhu and Yan Siqi should be promoted to admirals. The Ministry of War raised objections to this: although it was not due to fear of war , Yan Siqi could not even board a warship during the Battle of Manila Bay, so why should he be promoted to admiral? The Privy Council argued that seniority and daily contributions were also important. Finally, with the unanimous support of the cabinet and many ministers attending the meeting, the opinion of the Ministry of War was affirmed: the navy finally had a real admiral, but there was only one for the time being.
In addition, Zheng Wei, who died heroically, was posthumously promoted to rear admiral, and generous pensions were given to the soldiers who died in this battle. The Ministry of Rites also made regular reports on the preparations for this year's imperial examinations. These are all expected and need no elaboration.
After these routine matters were completed, in the second half of the meeting, Li Guojun, director of the State Administration for Industry and Commerce, which was affiliated with the Ministry of Households, first fired at the Ministry of Industry.
"Your Majesty, all the superiors. Since the court reformed the mining policy in the third year of Tianqi and allowed private capital to officially purchase and operate coal and iron mines, merchants from all over the Ming Dynasty have invested more than 120 million yuan in the past six months and purchased 88 iron mines and 178 large and small coal mines. A considerable number of iron and coal mines have already started production. Since these minerals are privately owned, the efficiency is indeed much higher. According to the data held by our General Administration of Industry and Commerce, in the second year of Tianqi, the whole country of Ming Dynasty produced a total of 230,000 tons of pig iron and 9 million tons of coal. Last year, that is, the third year of Tianqi, it was 290,000 tons and 9.45 million tons of coal. The growth rate is extremely gratifying, and the tax revenue received by the court has also increased rapidly. But!"
Li Guozhu knocked lightly on the table. "In actual work, the branches of the General Administration of Industry and Commerce in various places have found that the owners of iron and coal in various places are complaining about the serious lack of transportation capacity. A large amount of iron and coal cannot be transported after production. Or after being transported, the transportation costs and losses on the road are extremely high. Your Majesty, superiors, merchants from all over the country are asking when the Ministry of Industry will be able to build roads and railways, especially railways, to various mining areas. This question is still polite. Some bad-tempered mine owners simply said that the court deceived them. When they sold the minerals, they said that railways and roads would be extended soon. But now..."
He spread his hands and said, "If the road problem is not solved, the transportation capacity will naturally not be solved. The resulting situation is that large amounts of coal and iron are needed in various places, and the military factories need large amounts of coal and iron. However, the large amounts of coal and iron in Shanxi, Mongolia and other places cannot be transported out. Not only can the state not collect taxes, but these mine owners will also easily go bankrupt!"
Amid Li Guozhu's somewhat hurried report, the ministers naturally focused their attention on the Minister of Works Xu Guangqi.
Old Xu stood up a little annoyed and said, "Director Li, I understand your feelings, but no matter how anxious you are, the road can only be repaired inch by inch."
After saying this, Old Xu turned to Zhu Youdong and said, "Your Majesty, since the court decided to build the Hetao Heavy Industry Center last year, the Ministry of Industry immediately planned the highway and railway from Beijing to Baotou. However, the straight-line distance between these two places exceeds 500 kilometers, and the actual road conditions require crossing mountains and rivers to build bridges. Therefore, the Ministry of Industry has only completed the route survey so far. After the Ministry of Industry's emergency calculations, the actual mileage of the Beijing-Baotou Highway will reach 830 kilometers. The Beijing-Baotou Railway is basically a straight line because it passes through caves in the mountains and builds bridges over water, so the mileage is shortened, but it will also reach 650 kilometers. Such a long route, even if it starts this year, it will take at least five years to complete!
In addition, there is the issue of Shanxi's coal export. At present, the Ministry of Industry has organized personnel to start building the Beijing-Taihang Highway. Because the first half of this highway can directly use the completed section of the Beijing-Luoyang Highway, the actual construction mileage is only more than 200 kilometers, and it should be completed within three years. As for the railway built from east to west to the interior of Shanxi, everyone, the towering Taihang Mountains! The construction difficulty is really too great! "
"Grand Minister, I understand the difficulty of building a road from the eastern plains to the central mountains in our Ming Dynasty. But if it takes three to five years to complete the construction, all our merchants will go bankrupt!"
"Director Li, you passed! Sit down first."
"Grand Minister of Agriculture?"
"Over the years, how many problems has the Grand Chancellor solved for our Ming Dynasty? We must trust the Grand Chancellor. Besides, the Grand Chancellor is a cautious person. The three to five years he mentioned is probably only one to two years in reality."
"Xu Honggang, stop flattering me! Three to five years is a very optimistic estimate! If the geology or rock mass is unstable, it could take ten to twenty years!"
As Xu Honggang sarcastically supported Li Guojun, Xu Guangqi publicly fought back. First, the officials from the Ministry of Works and the Ministry of Revenue began to quarrel, and then the Ministry of War, whose interests were directly involved, also joined in. Later, other ministries also joined in the quarrel, and the order of the entire venue was suddenly disrupted.
The noise of the ministers below did not affect Zhu Youdong. He knocked on the table as usual and fell into deep thought.
In the Chinese Empire, due to the inconsistency of weights and measures in successive dynasties (for example, the difference between Han and Ming kilometres is huge), and the fact that scholars always like to write approximate figures when writing history books, it is difficult to say exactly how much coal and iron production there was in each dynasty. However, most historians of later generations agree that the Ming Dynasty was the peak of ancient China's steel production - at its peak, the annual output of steel was more than 150,000 tons.
China has been using coal to smelt iron since a long time ago. So, since the steel production in the Ming Dynasty reached the highest peak in ancient China, it is natural that the coal production in the Ming Dynasty must have been extremely high as well.
However, in the historical perspective, the Ming Dynasty's coal and iron production mainly came from the eastern region: Hebei, Anhui, Jiangxi and other places.
These places are either large plains or the Jiangnan region with dense water networks, so transportation is basically not a problem.
But now, the Ming Dynasty has begun the Industrial Revolution, and the demand for coal and iron will rise sharply: in the foreseeable future, the navy alone will be able to consume all the pig iron produced by the Ming Dynasty every year, and still not be full - after the first industrial revolution, if we really want to measure a country's national strength, isn't the gold standard the production of coal and iron?
Therefore, from this perspective, the Ming Dynasty must develop the mineral resources in the central provinces such as Shanxi, Mongolia, and Hubei: from the time when Qin Shihuang unified China to the present, the Chinese Empire has a history of nearly 2,000 years. After such a long period of time, there are not many mineral deposits in the eastern region that are easy to mine. If the rich mineral resources in the central and even western regions are not mined, there will not be enough steel to fight in the future.
As a time traveler, Zhu Youdong knows very well that for sea and even inland waterway transportation, transporting hundreds or even thousands of tons is a simple matter. But for road transportation, this amount is a bit scary: the roads in the Ming Dynasty were indeed cement roads, but on the one hand, horse-drawn carriages and donkey-drawn carts were still used on these cement roads, and on the other hand, these cement roads were only built according to the standards of 21st century village roads and could not withstand long-term pressure.
Therefore, if we want to transport the products from the central region in large quantities, we must use railways!
Hey, it turns out that if you want to get rich, you must first build roads. Why didn't I think of this and stupidly went straight to building an industrial base? Damn, no matter how well the industrial base is built, it's useless if the goods can't be transported out!
However, we Chinese are infrastructure maniacs, so there is no road that we cannot repair! Besides, we Chinese are also the most adaptable people.
After thinking carefully for a while, he slowly came up with an idea. Then he asked Fang Zhenghua to knock the gavel and restore order in the meeting.
"Well, Grand Marshal, I have three suggestions for the road construction."
"I ask the emperor for instructions."
"First, we will increase the construction funds, recruit more workers, and carry out construction on multiple sections of the surveyed route at the same time, and try to shorten the construction period while ensuring the quality of the project."
"…Your Majesty, the Ministry of Works has prepared 50,000 laborers for the Beijing-Baotou Highway, Railway, and Beijing-Taiyuan Highway. Since Your Majesty has said so, shall we increase the number to 100,000?"
"Sure, if it's not enough, you can add more. Tian Ergeng, it's time for the Wenxiang Sect on both sides of the canal to rebel, right?"
"Your Majesty, it will take at most one or two months."
"Well, don't we have this civilian worker? And he's very cheap."
"…Your Majesty is so wise, I admire you. Please give me the second plan."
"Second, it is indeed difficult to build the Beijing-Baotou Railway through the Taihang Mountains with the current technology, so I will not force it. However, the Ministry of Industry must build another railway that runs through all the mining areas in Shanxi, and then connect it to the Beijing-Baotou Railway through Datong. Although there are many plateaus and small mountain ranges in Shanxi Province, it is much simpler than crossing the Taihang Mountains, right?"
"...I will organize people to go to Shanxi to explore the route after the meeting."
"Okay, the above two items, no matter how fast, will take two to three years. And the army and merchants of our Ming Dynasty can't wait that long. Therefore, the Ministry of Industry must think about restoring navigation in the middle reaches of the Yellow River."
"Ah?" Xu Guangqi was stunned for a moment and quickly came to his senses: "Your Majesty, shipping in the middle reaches of the Yellow River has existed since ancient times, but this shipping is incomplete. Generally speaking, the middle reaches of the Yellow River at the junction of Qin and Jin are basically full of gorges but not dangerous, and more than 90% of the waterways can carry ships under 500 tons. However, Hukou Waterfall is completely unnavigable. In addition, there is the wandering river section from Yumenkou to Tongguan... Your Majesty, do you want to blow up Hukou and level the river?"
What is this? How can Hukou Waterfall explode? First of all, as a time traveler, I can't stand it emotionally.
"I remember that when civilian ships passed through Hukou, they all used the 'dry land sailing' method, right?"
"Yes, but Your Majesty, civilian boats are light. If they are loaded with coal, how can they be pulled through?"
"Think of a way. Install slide rails, use steam engines on both sides for traction, and modify the bottom of the boat a little bit. Mr. Xu, there are always more solutions than problems."
"I understand. I will go to Fangshan right after the meeting to gather relevant scholars for discussion."
"Well, as for the wandering river section from Yumenkou to Tongguan, Fang Zhenghua, after the meeting, ask the Tongzhengsi to send this part of today's meeting minutes to Baotou urgently, and ask Yuan Yingtai to take a look. Isn't he the general manager of Hetao Heavy Industry? He is the most anxious when the products are produced but cannot be shipped out."
"I obey your command."
"Good." Zhu Youdong clapped his hands with satisfaction and said, "In this way, I think that within three to five months, the waterway in the middle reaches of the Yellow River can be used. In this way, before the railway is built, we have an emergency measure. Guojun, are you satisfied?"
"I am very satisfied. Thank you, Your Majesty!"
