Wei Boqiu had a pipe in his mouth and slowly swayed around the city of Blackwater City. As the most prosperous city under the jurisdiction of the Heishui Pioneer Team of the Republic of East Coast of China, the permanent residents of Heishui Port are now close to 4,000 people, of which: Ming people account for 3o%, which is the largest ethnic group; 25% of the natives (including Hezhe, Ainu, Oroqen, Kyriak, etc.); North Koreans account for 2o%; Semu (including Poles, Tatars, and a small number of the 6th Army on the East Coast who had been discharged and settled due to wound and sickness) accounted for 16%; Six percent are black, and the rest are Japanese.

These are residents who have been living in the city for at least a year and are ready to continue to live in the city for a long time. Some of them are craftsmen, working in various occupations such as coopers, carpenters, rattan weavers, masons, blacksmiths, and leather craftsmen, and they can be said to be the cornerstone of the city's functioning. In addition, there were a large number of hunters, fishermen and peasants who provided food for the city, and among them, the hunters also joined the army to fight, and most of them were Sakhalin natives, also known locally as Shandan military households.

In addition, there are two quarries, a coal mine, and three lumber yards outside the city, where about 4,000 Qing soldiers captured in previous battles will be undergoing labor reform. In particular, the coal mine produced more than 4o tons of refined coal in the summer and autumn festivals, and the average daily coal burned by the more than a dozen steam-powered ships of the navy was less than 2o tons, so the coal mine still had a large amount of surplus coal for industrial use - mainly lime kilns, cement kilns, brick and tile wheel kilns, and wood retort kilns. In addition, the washed coal ash and gangue were also made into honeycomb coal, a domestic fuel, which became one of the best-selling goods in the local area, along with the tin stove. Even the Matsumae Domain of Japan, which was far away on the other side of the strait, repeatedly sent people to purchase such materials.

"Last year, 12,000 pieces of various colors of fur were exported to the local area, worth more than 10,000 yuan; exported a number of medicinal materials, salted dried fish (salmon, saury), silk tea and porcelain, and obtained a payment of less than 150,000 yuan after settlement; In addition, the re-export and sale of some weapons and equipment, cotton cloth, tobacco and cane sugar spirits, dyed leather goods, hardware products, pig iron steel bars and other commodities shipped from the local area made a profit of about 250,000 yuan, which is all the 'legitimate income' of the Heishui area in a year. A young man in a black uniform who followed behind Wei Boqiu looked at the residents of the city who walked by from time to time on both sides of the road, and reported softly: "This income is really not low. 5o a year, the main problem is that the expenses here are too large. In particular, military spending, according to my reading of the figures over the past few years, the average annual military expenditure ranges from 12o% to 15o% of the normal annual income. Such a huge military expenditure has lasted for four years, and there is still a certain fiscal surplus that feeds back to the country, which is ...... It can only be said that Mo Dashuai has a way to make money. ”

"It's all unstable income, and the economic system is still too fragile." As soon as Wei Boqiu heard it, he heard the problem. "In addition to the furs of the seals (northern Sakhalin) and bearskins (Sakhalin, the island of Zetu), the rest of the mink and fox skins, as well as the largest number of wild sheep, moose, and reindeer skins, are in the hands of the savage Jurchens, and the production should be very unstable. Except for bear bile, deer antler velvet and other local products that can be produced locally, the rest have to be purchased in North Korea, not to mention the high price. quality and quantity are also unstable; Silk porcelain tea is robbed, the source is even more unstable, salmon, saury salted dried fish is only used to meet the needs of a small number of domestic consumers who have a tendency to hunt, the market is also very limited, carefully calculated, the economy of the Heishui area is simply a mess, Mo Dashuai has been patronizing the war all these years. Well. To paraphrase, if there is an accident, then the local national economy will be on the verge of collapse. ”

"That's when we need it." The young man said with confidence, "This time, we have brought so many people here, so we can show our strengths." Blackwater Harbor has coal, wood, and fish, and the land on both sides of the Blackwater River is fertile, so it will definitely become the most prosperous city in the local area if you clean it up. ”

At present, there are two strongholds on the eastern shore of Sakhalin, one of which is the port of Blackwater. The core of the city wall, which has only just begun, is 5 square kilometers in size, and there are docks, forts and some residential areas outside the city. The buildings inside and outside the city are all large brick houses with fireplaces, which smell of hair, according to Wei Boqiu, and the residents have smeared their own ondols in their houses and bought some low-calorific fuels such as coal gangue for heating, although some also buy slightly more expensive charcoal for fuel. After four years of construction, the city can be said to be relatively "livable" compared to the rest of the island, Ezo on the other side of the strait, and North Manchurian on the left. The living conditions of the inhabitants are also far better than those places. And that's why Blackwater Harbor continues to attract people to settle down - who doesn't want to live a good life!

Another base on the island is Omari Port. To be honest, the people on the east coast of this stronghold have never worked hard to manage it well, and there are only a handful of masonry buildings at present. They are township governments, police stations, grain depots, material depots, health centers and other units. In addition, it is all wooden houses, including the Omari Exchange, which trades with the Japanese and Shandan people, and is a mixed structure of brick and wood, which is very simple. In addition, along the edge of the forest and river are large and neatly built single-storey wooden houses, which are owned by the township government and used by immigrants who stay there and wait for boats.

These migrants, who can reach more than 20,000 at their peak, farm and graze their cattle after April each year, as well as hunt and fish to make ends meet. In mid-to-late 10, when the northeasterly wind blows, they will be driven to the navy's transport ships like ducks, and then drift across the ocean to Australia. The floating population is far greater than the settled population, and this is the strange thing about Da Bo Port.

The only 2,000 or so settlers in the area are mostly Ming and Shandan, with a few Japanese as well. They were engaged in handicraft labour in the harbor, mainly weaving fishing nets, processing catches, and tanning leather in exchange for their subsistence rations. Occasionally, a few nimble guys who escaped from Daming opened some small hotels and restaurants in the port area, which is one of the few local business activities. They quickly saved up a small amount of money by crossing the mountains and mountains on their own days to buy some goods cheaply from the Shandan people and then shipping them to the bazaars to sell to the Japanese, while renting out their own hotels to Japanese merchants.

The most prosperous port city in this primitive port city was the Omari Exchange, which was responsible for the Shandan trade (a trade permitted by the Japanese shogunate), where the Japanese transported sulphur and grain, and then bought back large quantities of silk, silk, tea, porcelain, East Coast textiles, armor, sabers, and even pig iron and steel. Although the amount is not very large. But it has been growing rapidly over the years. The newcomer Wei Boqiu has the important task of revitalizing the local economy, so he will definitely make more fuss about this exchange.

In addition to the Dabo Exchange, the most famous of the Dabo Port is the women's standing team, which now only exists in Yantai and Dabo. Except for a few women from Korea in the early days, most of the later ones were from captive Qing military officials, wives and daughters of generals, and a few were wives and daughters of gentry who resisted the army on the east coast. Most of the clientele of such institutions comes from soldiers from the Stand Up Force, the Eight Banners Forces nouvelles in South Africa. This is one of the few ways to recycle the cash they have on hand. In addition, some Shandans, Japanese, and Ainu people who come to Omari for business also frequent.

"The finances of the Blackwater region are extremely deformed right now." Wei Boqiu looked at the hurried crowd on the street, and then whispered to his student Chen Shuo: "But the local area will never allow enterprises such as steel mills, textile mills, machine manufacturing plants, and machinery processing factories to appear in the Heishui area, and the only cement kilns, lime kilns, brick and tile wheel kilns, and a small shipyard are the limit. Anything else, the Executive Committee would be worried that it would get out of control and intervene forcefully. Moreover, Mo Dashuai will return to his home country next year. At this time, he will not risk making political mistakes to make wedding dresses for others. Therefore, it is not easy to develop the local economy - because the locals have never thought of expanding here, and they are even reluctant to see it grow. ”

"But the two treaty ports that North Korea has opened are not being put to good use." Chen Shuo reminded, "Teacher, according to our estimates, North Korea should have a population of about six million now, and this market is still very broad. ”

"That's just six million serfs. Where does the market come from? Serfs had no spending power. Wei Boqiu said disdainfully, "What can the North Koreans sell to us now?" Every year, selling some grain is still procrastinating, pushing, and hindering, and it is more refreshing to sell wild ginseng and a little Chinese herbal medicine. But speaking of which, I recall that the Dutch, during their routine negotiations last year, had begged us to sell some of their population to them, and they were going to open up the East Indies, but the mortality rate was too high, so there was an urgent need for a large number of people. It was a good business to sell Koreans to the East Indies. I'll have to try it later. ”

When Chen Shuo heard this, he immediately took out a pen and paper and wrote down Wei Boqiu's words. As the head of the No. 2 Research Office (Economic Research Office) of the former Mei Agency, he will be Wei Boqiu's main assistant in managing economic affairs in the Heishui area. Incidentally, since Wei Boqiu was implicated in the burning of the barracks, he was demoted to the post of deputy commander of the gendarmerie, and then he was kicked to the Far East, where he was responsible for supervising the affairs of the Far East, with the rank of captain (enjoying the treatment of a major). However, considering the economic talents of this gentleman. Therefore, he was also entrusted with the important task of revitalizing the local economy by the executive committee, and the first thing he had to do was to straighten out the mess of Mo Ming and Mo Dashuai.

To revitalize the economy, it is nothing more than to develop productive forces and trade. The productivity of the Heishui area is not liked by the Executive Committee, so the only way to make money is to do more trade. At present, the only people who can do some business with the East Coast are almost the Koreans and the Japanese. However, these two businesses are not large-scale, and the North Koreans are reluctant and have little purchasing power; The Japanese, on the other hand, were limited to the shogunate's ban on the country, and the Toshiki's current small trade with the Matsumae clan was still carried out in the name of the Shandan trade permitted by the shogunate, but as a result, the number of goods was greatly limited, and the supply could only be increased in small amounts year by year, and it was not possible to quickly enter the Japanese market with goods.

In addition to these two countries, the other trade partner is obviously the Dutch, and this is also an object that Wei Boqiu attaches great importance to, after all, the complementarity between the two sides is too strong. The government has already paved the way for this area, and the government has packaged and sold some backward technologies that are on the verge of obsolescence (and the germ of such technologies has also appeared in Europe) to the Dutch. According to the agreement, the Dutch will also pay for the purchase of technology in October this year - 5,000 tons of rice.

And the Dutch are naturally not slow. On June 2o, 1647, while Mo Dashuai's fleet was still sailing in the vast Yellow Sea, a large Dutch fleet suddenly sailed outside the port of Blackwater, which were Dutch grain ships loaded with 5,000 tons of rice - the largest blood transfusion from the mainland to the Far East.

Although I don't know why the Dutch changed the delivery location from Dabo Port to Blackwater Port, Wei Boqiu is still extremely happy about their arrival, and he still has many business cooperation projects to discuss with the Dutch.

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