Compared with the economically underdeveloped Philippine Islands and East Indonesia, West Indonesia, where Sri Buddha died, is relatively wealthy. On the one hand, there are deceitful primitive indigenous tribes without the concept of property rights, and on the other hand, there are feudal countries with developed civilizations. Naturally, the Travelers who like to work with civilized people tend to focus their work in the South Seas on Indochina and Java, Sumatra, but the rich Moluccas, which are rich in resources, are hard to abandon.

In ancient times, when a pound of spices was worth a pound of silver, this archipelago that could produce at least 2,000 tons of various spices per year was simply a huge renewable silver mine.

There are many varieties of spices, and the prices of various spices vary widely. History textbooks of the 21st century say that rare spices such as pepper and cardamom were once as valuable as the same volume of gold. The spices of the West and the East may be different. No one in China considers ginger and garlic to be valuable spices. In the medieval West, ginger and garlic were also scarce spices. According to the broadest definition of spices, spice production in the early 12th century would not have exceeded 1 million tons. In fact, there are only a few kinds of spices in the narrow sense, such as pepper, nutmeg, cloves, cinnamon, etc. Animal spices such as musk, ambergris, civet and beaver are often overlooked. Those Chinese onions, ginger and garlic, mint, laurel leaves, star anise, litsea cubeba seeds, lemongrass, osmanthus and small flower jasmine, white orchid, tree orchid, Indian sandalwood and lemongrass, Egyptian jasmine, Arabic **, myrrh, Guyana's rosewood, Madagascar's vanilla, Paraguay's petitgrain leaves, France's lavender, Bulgaria's rose, American spearmint and Italy's citrus are basically common incense or edible flavorings. Its place in the history of trade and economy is far inferior to that of spices in the narrow sense.

Even though they have planted spice plantations on Dongyi Island and Hainan Island, they are still unable to compete with the equatorial archipelago, which has little money.

This legendary archipelago, after its occupation, could contribute at least 10,000 tons of spices to the world every year. This is nothing compared to the highest global supply of 1 million tonnes in the future, but at a time when only one percent of the world's population can afford to consume spices in the 21st century.

This terrifying 10,000-ton output can suddenly turn spices as heavy as silver into the price of cabbage.

The crossing crowd eats meat, and the partners and other seas also have to drink some soup.

Nanyang Development Group has two main businesses, one is to establish trade relations with various civilized countries in Southeast Asia, import a large number of agricultural and sideline products and minerals from various countries, export the finished products of the Chinese Empire, and earn huge profits from scissors; The other is the establishment of plantations of various cash crops by a large number of immigrants to provide more raw materials and strategic materials (such as rubber and quinine) for the country.

What are the profits of the important industries in the tropics? What is the importance of tropical agriculture? Anyone with a little common sense of the national economy knows that the pillar industry was agriculture before the society entered industrialization. But what can provide enough raw capital for industrialization is high-profit cash crop agriculture. The Netherlands made their fortune on cod from the North Sea fishing grounds and spices from the Moluccas, England on wool, France on native wheat and indigo and fur from the Americas, Portugal on sugar from the Madras Islands and paradise grains (pepper-like spices) from West Africa, and Spain saw the vast non-tropical colonies that did not produce gold, silver, and spice cane sugar as bargaining chips to be discarded.

Pre-industrial world trade was a commodity trade around plants. In the 21st century, when an airplane can offset tens of thousands of tons of sugar, naturally no one thinks that agriculture is profitable. But in the pre-industrial world, a hundred tons of pepper could buy a country in the Middle Ages. A monopoly on the prices of cash crops and spice crops in Southeast Asia and India is as meaningful as a monopoly on the prices of oil and the US dollar in the 21st century. With pricing power over the core categories of commodities, blood can be drawn around the world.

In a slave society, in order to control a country, it is necessary to control food and salt. Therefore, the Chinese government monopolized the benefits of mountains and seas (the monopoly system of salt and iron that appeared during the time of Guan Zhong, and iron was mainly used for agricultural tools and munitions). In the feudal era, if you want to control a country, you must control the right to mint coins, and the five-baht coins that have been circulating for hundreds of years appeared in the Han Dynasty. In the imperial era, in order to centralize power and strengthen the weak branches, it was necessary to monopolize all the industries that could strengthen local power with huge profits, such as wine, tea, alum, sugar, incense and medicinal materials (all imported seasoning spices and medicinal spices such as **), luxury goods (ivory, rhinoceros horn, agarwood, pearls, etc.). In the era of capitalism, it is necessary to control the financial industry and the foundation of the country, the pillar industries (all manufacturing and scale industries). When the era evolves into the era of imperialism, it will be exponentially more difficult to control a country, and almost everything needs to be controlled. Hence the emergence of a planned economy and a socialist state.

The Crossing Crowd was to get this symbolizing the most powerful power of the age - the monopoly of spices - before the Crusaders became the climate.

China, which concentrates 80% to 90% of the world's high-end consumption power, has seen a significant increase in demand for spices within the country. With an area of just a few tens of thousands of square kilometres, the archipelago supplies the cloves and most of the pepper needed throughout Asia, so it will be a cornucopia and a gold mine for decades to come.

The Rite of Buddha and the Kingdom of Angkor were considered civilized for a simple reason. There is a large population and developed agriculture here. As long as the doors of these countries are opened, a steady stream of industrial products and imported raw materials from the Chinese Empire can directly skip the plant age and advance world trade to the liberal era of cloth trade, silk trade, arms trade and mineral trade as bulk trade goods in the industrial age.

Ships loaded with building materials such as silk, tea, liquor, medicinal herbs, porcelain, cloth, coins, ironware, swords, paper, glass, hardware, and reinforced concrete arrived at the ports of civilized countries with spending power in exchange for gold, silver, copper, iron, tin ingots, abaca and jute, palm oil, cane sugar, dyes, spices, precious wood, rubber, quinine, pearls, cotton, tobacco, coffee, curry, betel nuts, tropical fruits, and so on. There are also nickel ore, bauxite and manganese ore, which are urgently needed in the country. The sparsely populated Moluccas, which simply can't digest many consumer goods, is so that a small amount of consumer goods can satisfy the islands' natives, and it takes a lot of people to pick the local spices, which are almost worthless. Is it more profitable to trade without emptying either end or going to the Spice Islands almost empty, and returning home with spices to sell? Trade with civilized nations can guarantee at least 1200% profit on a round trip, and a trip to the Moluccas, bringing back a shipload of spices, is at most 800% profitable. (It can't be compared to Vasco da Gama's 80 times the profit of a trip to India.) But this route takes only 10 times the time of da Gama. It means that there are not many concessions to the windfall profits of Lao Da)

Building a plantation requires a lot of manpower and materials. The uninhabited islands of East Indonesia and the Philippine Islands cost at least ten times more to develop than in countries such as Sri Buddha. At last glance, the Spice Islands, the source of wealth in the eyes of everyone, have become the chicken ribs that pass through the tasteless food in the eyes of everyone and are a pity to discard. It is also a matter of course to hand over the construction and operation rights of coastal ports such as the Sulu Sea, the Bohol Sea, the Sulawesi Sea, and the Moluca Sea to partners and designated support targets.

In addition, cross-border trade in this era needs to rely on the trade winds as a source of power. There are up to 2 round-trip trade routes a year, although the number of boat runs can be increased to 10 times on the ultra-high-speed clipper ship and the zigzag route that can take advantage of the eight-sided wind. But the profit difference of such a route is also magnified by five times.

In other words, the opportunity cost has disappointed the travelers with the Spice Islands. The small fish and shrimp saw that the behemoth that was a whale didn't take a fancy to this cornucopia, so they naturally rushed up and beat their heads and bled out. Hundreds of spice trading houses and shipping companies have sold their land, real estate, and other industrial assets, and concentrated their capital to buy ships and warehouses, preparing to get a piece of the next spice feast.

When the fleet arrived in the Moluccas, it was discovered that the facilities were so poor that none of the coastal settlements had more than 2,000 people. Small fishing villages and small ports simply could not satisfy the large merchant fleet. Although almost all sailors and crew went to the islands to harvest spices for little money, the speed of loading was simply unwarranted due to the capacity and dock facilities.

The small fish and shrimp are beginning to appreciate the benefits of trading with civilized regions. Many captains and shopkeepers of the trading houses had to meet together to raise funds to build a few basic wharves that could handle at least 2,000 tons of supplies before the trade winds of the coming year.

Seeing the request of many partners to propose cooperation in the development of the Moluccas, the Crossing will naturally not be indifferent, and immediately launched a huge construction plan covering the entire Southeast Asia. (To be continued.) )