"Your Excellency has a good point," laughed a dozen merchants in the room.

"This time, I invited you to buy your materials in large quantities, and I wanted to establish a chamber of commerce."

I saw Zeng Zhaoyi arch his hand and said: "You understand what the villain said in the first point, can the Chamber of Commerce you said in the second explain it to the villain."

Xiao Zheng smiled and said: "It is said that the chamber of commerce can also be understood as an alliance, that is, an alliance in the same industry, for example, you are all selling bricks and stones, then more than a dozen people here can form a construction chamber of commerce, the chamber of commerce adopts open management, as long as the peers can join, usually the chamber of commerce is to strengthen the contact between the industry, coordinate the interests of the same industry, one to prevent malicious competition, two to prevent bullying and domination, safeguard your legitimate rights and interests to promote the development of the industry, of course, you can also form a regional chamber of commerce, For example, the Chuzhou Chamber of Commerce is fine."

Zeng Zhaoyi thought for a while and asked, "Then my lord, does this chamber of commerce have a leader?" ”

"Absolutely! The president of the Chamber of Commerce can be elected by everyone among the members, or they can take turns to sit in the bank, and the important thing is that when you have something to do with the court, you can first make a decisive decision within the Chamber of Commerce, and then negotiate with the court. This is also an important link between businessmen and the government, and of course, if you do good deeds, the chamber of commerce can also come forward to coordinate it."

Then Pei Mingli took a copy of the charter and handed it to everyone, and these people listened to Xiao Zheng's explanation of the terms that they didn't know much about.

"My lord, we have established this chamber of commerce, it is better to choose a day than to hit the day, just my lord, you are here, we will set up this construction chamber of commerce now" is worthy of being a businessman, all of them are shrewd.

"Okay, I'll draft the documents of the Chamber of Commerce," Xiao Zheng said with a smile.

After more than a dozen merchants signed their names, everyone discussed and chose Zeng Zhaoyi as the president, so happy that this guy couldn't see it.

"Ladies and gentlemen, since the Chamber of Commerce has been established, it is time to come up with a reasonable price for the materials used in road construction, and there is no rush at this time. In addition, with all due respect, even if the materials of more than a dozen of your houses are all open and supplied, they will not meet my needs for this road, and I am going to teach you to use a new building material to build the road, which is called concrete."

"Concrete? What is it? Zeng Zhaoyi asked curiously.

"You are not in a hurry, but before we get this thing again, we will first burn something called cement, and I will pay you a part of the deposit, which will be used to build the cement kiln, and I will ask the person who oversees the craftsman to guide you in what to do. But don't ask more about the formula, when the first batch of goods comes out, you will make a reasonable price for me, please rest assured, you will never lose money in the next place, of course, you can not miss the tax of the official."

"Haha..., please rest assured, I have heard and witnessed your benevolence, and we will never worry about it in our lives with you," Zeng Zhaoyi said with a smile.

"Everyone, during the firing of this cement, the formula and materials used must be kept secret, I and you are ready to sign a confidentiality agreement, how to keep the workers confidential, you have to figure out a way, but if anyone dares to leak the secret recipe for small profits, don't blame the official for not recognizing people."

Everyone was frightened by Xiao Zheng's stern tone, and they all arched their hands and said, "Please rest assured, I will understand!" ”

Li Shimin, a native of Chang'an, suddenly received a strange letter from Xiao Zheng, asking Li Shimin to confirm in the name of an official document that cement was invented by the villagers of Shenhe Bay, which is a patent.

This is strange, Li Shimin saw this thing cement at Wannian Bridge when he was repairing Chang'an to Luoyang, and knew that this thing was made by Xiao Zheng, but there is no need to give you written confirmation at the national level, something is abnormal.

Called Fang Xuanling over and asked, Lao Fang was also happy, if other officials came up to say this, it would be light to be reprimanded, the key is that what Xiao Gong handed over must have other plans.

"What the hell is he trying to do?" Li Shimin asked.

"I don't know about this minister, but it's likely that he wants to cheat money again," Fang Xuanling said very bluntly.

"Haha, whatever he does, for the sake of him knocking Feng Ang 500,000 loads of grain, I'm right!" Li Shimin said with a smile.

As soon as the rice was harvested, the general manager of Sannan Province issued a list to rebuild the official roads of Yangzhou, Hangzhou and Chuzhou, and after the official roads were repaired, only commodity taxes were collected, and all the Ding taxes and other taxes when entering the city were cancelled.

On the official road leading to the three places, there were many farmers who had fallen from the peasants, and the official road, which was only two or three zhang wide, was expanded to an astonishing twenty zhang.

As soon as the road was repaired, the bricks and stones in Yangzhou and Hangzhou really rose rapidly, but there was no big price fluctuation in Chuzhou, and it seemed that the builders in Chuzhou played a role. The rise in masonry prices has made some families who are ready to build houses at home complain, but after all, there are not many people who build houses, and it has not caused too much of a bad impact. It's just that it's hard to see the bulk of bricks and stones used in road repair on the market, and even if there is, the price has risen by three or four percent compared with the original.

"It seems that these people are not small, they didn't produce much but learned to bully and dominate the market," Xiao Zheng said happily.

"My lord, do you want to ask the saints for an order to arrest them directly, these cheap businessmen" Xu Jingzong asked Xiao Zheng.

"Lao Xu, why should you arrest people if they are operating legally? Now Yangzhou, Chuzhou and Hangzhou have just improved a little, and all industries are waiting to be prosperous, so you will arrest people because of the price increase, who will dare to do business in the future? The business affairs still need to be solved with the business affairs, this is when the Turks invaded Chang'an, those black-hearted grain merchants took advantage of the fire to rob the saints and did not do anything to them."

"Then my lord, we can only watch them sit on the ground and raise the price," Xu Jingzong asked.

"Don't worry, Lao Xu, I'll find you something to do, and I'll make some money back after this thing is done," Xiao Zheng whispered in Xu Jingzong's ear.

"You are the best at playing with these yin," Xiao Zheng patted Xu Jingzong's shoulder and said.

"I ......, and the subordinate obeys the order."

Xiao Zheng didn't worry too much about the rising price of masonry, and he didn't even buy it.

Instead, they recruited merchants from the builder's chamber of commerce, and under the leadership of the overseer, they found a place with clay and limestone and quickly set up more than a dozen cement kilns, and the burned cement was wrapped in oilcloth and sent to the construction site.

In front of Zeng Zhaoyi and several masonry shopkeepers, Xiao Zheng asked the workers to mix the cement with water, pour the pebbles and sand pulled from the river into the cement slurry, mix it evenly, pour it into the wooden mold of the road surface that has been compacted, and press out the smooth surface with an iron trowel and no longer move.

Many people can't figure out why this soft and mud-like thing is placed on the top of the road, and people can make a pit when they step on it, so how to walk in the future?

What everyone didn't expect was that it was only one night, and when I looked at it again, the road surface was almost as hard as stones, and the key was that the road surface was still smooth, and the car couldn't feel bumps when walking on it.

"My lord, the concrete you invented is a good thing, it is much faster than grinding stones," Pei Mingli said in surprise.

"That is, although it is a little slow to burn cement, it is not a little faster than knocking stones."