At the beginning of the founding of the Tang Empire, that is, during the period of Emperor Li Erbi Taizuwu, there was no national policy for the development of industry and commerce, even after the death of Emperor Taizuwu, the first few years of the succession of Li Xuan, the son of heaven, there was no talk of developing industry and commerce, at most it was just engaging in industry, and industry was also limited to weapon manufacturing.

The Tang Empire really began to develop industry after the capital of Zhaoqing, when in order to meet the needs of the national defense industry, the Tang Empire began to engage in extra-high industry.

After conquering Guangzhou, in order to obtain more taxes and profits to support the war, he began to enter overseas trade, and established the Guangzhou Trade Zone.

The huge pressure of military spending caused by the war was the direct reason for the vigorous development of industry and commerce in the early years of the Tang Empire.

After the capital of Jinling, the national policy of the Tang Empire has basically been established, with agriculture as the backbone, industry as the flesh, and commerce as the blood.

Among them, agriculture is undoubtedly the most important, and in an era when grain production is not high, a big country does not develop agriculture, but engages in industry and commerce, and that is undoubtedly self-defeating.

Filling the stomachs of the vast number of imperial people is the current core national policy of the Tang Empire, and most of the other policies are carried out around this article.

If you want to fill your stomach, you need food, and when you have money, you can't import a lot of food from the outside world, so you can only rely on growing food yourself.

Therefore, between agriculture and industry and commerce, agriculture is the basic.

Industry and commerce, in fact, are just auxiliaries!

This point, even in the Tang Empire, has been fully reflected, don't look at the Tang Empire's industry and commerce are booming, but in the empire's annual financial expenditure, whether it is the central or local government, the resource support that industry and commerce can get is far inferior to the resource support obtained by agriculture.

What is the purpose of the large-scale water conservancy construction called for by the empire? Isn't it just to resist natural disasters and increase grain production, as for the development of inland waterway shipping brought about by this, it is only incidental

The empire imposed a unified agricultural tax and suppressed land rents, which was still for the survival of the vast number of peasants, and the resulting landlords sold off a large number of lands and then invested their funds in industry and commerce, which was only incidental.

Even foreign expansion, the establishment of colonies, and the proposal of global strategies are also aimed at obtaining more land and alleviating the food pressure brought about by the growth of the population.

Even industry and commerce themselves were meant to serve the people of the empire.

The development of industry and commerce, especially technology, could lead to a more convenient production environment, lower product costs, and higher transportation levels, while also allowing a large number of people of the empire to obtain employment opportunities other than farming.

The people live on food!

Li Xuan saw this very thoroughly, so even if he knew that there was not much hope, he still supported the Royal Institute of Technology to carry out research on hybrid rice in the Qiongzhou Prefecture area.

And many other policies, most of them, were also in the service of feeding the people of the empire.

If there is any difference between the Tang Empire and the feudal dynasties that inhibited the development of industry and commerce such as the former Ming Dynasty, it is that the Tang Empire believed that industry and commerce could effectively assist and even promote the development of agriculture, thereby improving the level of people's livelihood.

And the former Ming and other dynasties did not think so.

This is not to say that the former Ming and other feudal dynasties that suppressed the development of industry and commerce were wrong, in fact, they were right.

In an era of low science and technology and even lower productivity, industry and commerce, especially the commercial part of it, that is, the ordinary transportation of goods from place A to place B, will not produce much value at all, but will attract more people to engage in commerce instead of farming, which will lead to a decline in the agricultural population.

What happens when there are fewer people who farm, food production is low, and there is no way to get a lot of food from the outside, when the total population is so large?

Hungry to death!

But in the Tang Empire, it is different!

The industry and commerce of the Tang Empire were built on the premise of the progress of science and technology and the initial opening of the industrial revolution!

The progress of science and technology has brought about a substantial increase in productivity, and the development of overseas trade has allowed the Tang Empire to import a large number of materials from the outside.

The development of industry and commerce gave the empire a strong financial power, which in turn assisted the development of agriculture!

Otherwise, where do you think the empire gets the huge amount of money it spends on building water facilities every year? It is not obtained from industry and commerce.

With the development of industry and commerce, the economy is better, the finances are rich, and the water conservancy and other infrastructure facilities are good, we will be able to turn the inferior fields into medium-class fields and the medium-sized fields into high-quality fields, and the ability to resist floods and droughts will be higher, and the grain output will naturally be higher.

Especially in the southern provinces, because of the cultivation of rice, the dependence on water conservancy facilities is even more serious, and good water conservancy facilities are a prerequisite for increasing grain production.

At the same time, the progress of science and technology can also greatly improve the efficiency of agricultural production!

In the past, steel was so expensive, even hoes, sickles, and many people could not afford to use them, but now, the production of steel has increased significantly, the price of steel has also dropped significantly, and the price of agricultural tools has also been greatly reduced.

What's more, the development of modern science and technology is also to make the development of agricultural tools gradually scientific, new design or improvement of a large number of agricultural tools that can effectively improve agricultural production efficiency, such as rice thresher, developed and produced by Zhaoqing Machinery Company a kind of equipment, of course, the great Son of Heaven is also given a certain guidance.

This kind of threshing machine is actually the rice thresher used in the nineties and even in the new century, there are still many southern rural areas using the rice threshing machine, a wooden box, there is a wooden roller full of iron nails, connected by gears and foot pedals, people can drive the roller to rotate at high speed by repeatedly stepping on the foot pedal, and then put in the rice, the grain will be directly flying, blocked by the wooden planks above and in front, and falling into the wooden box below.

This kind of rice threshing machine, although it still uses manpower, its threshing efficiency is much faster than the previous way of directly handing the rice and beating it vigorously.

Later, Zhaoqing Machinery Company came up with a thresher specially used for removing wheat grains.

The development of science and technology has brought about an increase in agricultural productivity, freed up more manpower to reclaim and plant more land, and further increased grain production.

Therefore, in the Tang Empire, agriculture and industry and commerce were mutually reinforcing, and there was no contradiction of distance like other feudal dynasties.

This also further stimulated the development of the empire's industry and commerce!

The development of industry and commerce has attracted countless landlords and gentry to invest their funds in the field of industry and commerce, and industry and commerce have developed rapidly, as the most important force in transportation, shipping has also been explosively growing!

And this growth rate has started since the early days of the founding of the country, and it is still not over!

There are countless shipyards in the Tang Empire, and the shipbuilding industry is also the only heavy industry in China with a large amount of private capital.

The large number of people entering and the large amount of capital have also led to the fact that although the market is large, the competition is more intense, especially after years of brutal growth, many shipowners are also recovering their rationality, although they will still wave the checks of the Tang Royal Bank to order ships everywhere.

However, the quality requirements for ships are also getting higher and higher, and the era of countless people grabbing boats built by a few random carpenters is gone.

The reason for this situation is that more than 20 large shipyards in China have fought fiercely for market share, and these large shipyards have abundant funds and strong technology, and the quality of the ships built is good, although the price is a little higher, but it has great competitiveness in the market.

In this case, a large number of shipowners are inclined to order ships from large shipyards, while a large number of small and medium-sized shipyards are actually relying on price advantages to compete.

But how long will this last?

Even Chen Lifu, a discerning person, knows that although the shipbuilding industry seems to be still in a golden period of development, this golden period of development does not belong to those small and medium-sized shipyards, but to large shipyards.

Once the market demand is not so large, I don't know how many small and medium-sized shipyards will go out of business.

In this environment, it is not a small risk to rush into the shipbuilding industry.

What's more, Feng's Company is still a shipping company, which is not compatible with the shipbuilding industry.

Don't look at the fact that both are related to shipping, but in fact, the difference is big!

The shipping company sounds lofty, but in fact it is to spend money to buy a ship, and then hire a captain or sailor or something, you can make money by transporting goods, and there is basically no technical content.

And the shipyard, this is a serious manufacturing industry, the technology content is very high, and you can't play shipbuilding without some technology.

Today, the shipbuilding industry of the Tang Empire, after so many years of barbaric development, has already appeared I don't know how many shipyards, there are more than 20 large shipyards, only on both sides of the Yangtze River there are more than a dozen large shipyards, the north bank of the Huangpu River is just a few tens of kilometers away, there are four large shipyards, the famous Jiangnan shipyard is here.

As for small and medium-sized shipyards, it's even more.

The influx of capital means that competition will be very motivating, and many small and medium-sized shipyards with little technology today rely on today's market heat and low prices to survive.

The large shipyards, without exception, are researching more advanced shipbuilding technology, improving the performance of ships, and reducing costs, in order to gain a larger market share and earn more profits.

Once the market is not good, those large shipyards will also engage in price wars, and small and medium-sized shipyards will immediately be able to close down a large area!

In this case, the risk of Fung entering the shipbuilding industry is considerable.