In order to lighten the burden on the peasants and prevent the peasants from selling grain at a low price when they have just harvested grain in order to pay agricultural tax, the agricultural tax is different from the commercial tax, and the collection of agricultural tax is always a tax in kind.

In order to solve the problems of expropriation in kind and discounting, the Cabinet has set up a grain storage department directly under the Cabinet to deal with the procurement, storage, transportation, and sale of grain, and to stabilize grain prices.

Generally speaking, the newly collected grain will be sold by the National Treasury Department to the Grain Storage Department at the market price, and the discounted cash will be deposited in the national treasury and entered into the fiscal expenditure system.

Some of the large quantities of grain purchased by the Grain Reserves Department from the Finance Department will be sealed as local reserve grain, and most of it will be sold directly by the Reserves Department at the grain collection site to meet the grain needs of local urban residents.

The main function of the grain storage department is to put the collected grain in kind into the state treasury at a discount, and the other is to reserve grain to cope with the famine year, and another major function is to guide the normalization of grain prices and crack down on any speculators who dare to play low on grain and sell it high.

The source of food for the Reserve Division is the Empire's agricultural tax revenue, and it has more than 5% of the Empire's total annual grain production in reserve at any time.

Its huge grain reserves are enough to make any grain merchant stop!

Why?

Because as long as the grain storage department finds that there are abnormal fluctuations in grain prices in the market, especially when the grain prices are abnormally high, and those speculators try to sell high and buy low, the grain storage department can mobilize a large amount of grain supply market at any time, which is enough to make grain prices plummet overnight.

In the past two years, more than a dozen large grain merchants active in Jiangsu and Zhejiang have closed down. The reason for the collapse was all because they tried to manipulate grain prices for profit, and after being discovered by the Grain Storage Division, they threw out a large amount of grain reserves in a short period of time, which led to a sharp drop in grain prices and heavy losses, and then went bankrupt.

Most of the grain merchants who can survive do business in a regular manner, or take the initiative to change and start to upgrade their business methods. For example, some people have begun to invest in the construction of flour mills, from a single grain purchase and sale to a primary grain processor.

Some also take the initiative to cooperate with the grain storage department, as long as they keep the price within the market range, the grain storage department does not mind cooperating with them, and can provide them with a large amount of grain.

After all, although some of the grain in the grain storage department is reserve grain, most of it still needs to be realized, and these grains that need to be realized generally need to be transported to urban areas for sale.

After all, the Grain Storage Department is a government agency, not an enterprise, not even a state-owned enterprise. Although they have a large amount of grain on hand, it is impossible for them to set up their own rice stores for retail, and most of the grain stored by the grain storage department is still distributed through large-scale wholesale, and then circulated into the retail channels of major grain merchants, and finally circulated to the hands of urban residents.

In the past two years, most of the grain merchants in various places have begun to change, especially some large grain merchants, who need a large supply of goods and then sell them to major cities. And there is no one person or institution that can have more food than the Food Storage Division.

Some small and medium-sized grain merchants have little influence, because they usually go to the countryside to buy grain in person. Then they set up grain stores in county towns or prefectures to sell them, and their impact on grain prices is extremely limited, as long as the grain prices remain stable, they can make money.

No matter what era it is, as long as it is linked to grain, it is a major matter, and in order to ensure fiscal revenue, to stabilize grain prices, and to ensure that the peasants' interests are not harmed. The Imperial Cabinet can be said to have thought of many ways.

From the taxation of the Ministry of Finance, to the circulation of bulk grain, to the retail price of grain in the market, etc., all of these have traces of the intervention of the imperial government.

As for what kind of capitalization is discussed, it is unrealistic for the Chinese Empire for the time being. Because the current industrial and commercial development of the entire empire is uneven, marketization is not sufficient, and some commodities that do not affect people's livelihood can be completely marketized, and the imperial government will not intervene. However, with regard to grain, a major issue concerning the people's food and clothing, it is very necessary for the government to regulate and control it.

Although the government has not directly set up a grain storage department to intervene in the market as it does for the grain industry, the current domestic heavy industry enterprises are basically all royal industries, and although the royal industries are commercially operated, no one can deny their official nature.

Therefore, the government, or the emperor Lin Zhe, still regulates the domestic heavy industry very strictly.

"At present, the steel industry and the major machinery industry are very dependent on imported coal, and the price of coal in Shanghai's coal market has risen continuously this year, Australian coal has risen from last year's low seven taels of customs silver, and British anthracite has risen to eleven taels. The rise in coal prices has led to a lot of increase in the operating costs of major enterprises! ”

Listening to Pan Lixuan say this, Lin Zhe's mind was also turning rapidly, as a later generation, he knew very well that China was originally a country with considerable coal reserves, and the Shanxi coal boss of later generations was famous throughout the country.

But the tragedy is that the areas rich in coal resources and easy to mine are not under his control, and the areas of Shanxi, Zhili and Fengtian are all under the control of the Qing court.

"In order to solve the current shortage of domestic coal production and meet the coal demand of domestic enterprises and ships, we now plan to establish a large-scale coal mining base in Xuzhou!"

Pan Lixuan continued, Lin Zhe also turned the report in his hand to the page of the Xuzhou coal base in a timely manner, which said that the coal mine in Xuzhou is easy to mine, and although the mining area is a little away from the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal, it is not impossible to overcome, and it is expected to use a large number of livestock vehicles to transport, and it is expected to be able to transport about 30,000 tons of coal out of the country every year.

Seeing that the plan said that the land transportation of coal should use ox carts, horse-drawn carts and other livestock vehicles, Lin Zhe couldn't help but think of the railway again.

It has been several years since he came to this era, and he has been learning about some foreign development information through the Shanghai Business Zone, a window for foreign exchanges, and learned that Britain carried out crazy railway construction in the thirties and forties, and after the large-scale construction of railways in Britain, Germany, the United States, France and other countries also quickly followed suit, and by today in 1858, railway technology has been very mature.

However, for China, the investment in building railways is too huge, and it is basically impossible to build them on a large scale if the government invests them, and a railway will require tens of millions or even hundreds of millions of investments, which will not build a few railways even if the annual fiscal revenue is smashed into it.

However, today, since the royal industry plans to build a coal base in Xuzhou, and there is also a demand for land transportation, Lin Zhe feels that it is necessary to take this opportunity to carry out a pilot.

Although China today does not have the funds to build those hundreds or even thousands of kilometers of artery railways, it is still possible to build a small railway of several tens of kilometers.

As long as the pilot is successful, it can be carried out in some important areas, such as between mining areas and inland waterways, and between important cities, such as Shanghai to Nanjing.

However, even if it is a pilot, the government cannot pay for it itself, and if it wants to build a railway, it can only be carried out by commercial capital, and for this kind of experimental project, and the project is extremely expensive, only the royal industry can take the lead.

Immediately, he said to Pan Li: "The mining of Xuzhou coal mine is feasible, and in this regard, the royal industry can continue to be promoted and strive to be put into production as soon as possible. ”

"Railroad?" Pan Lixuan is not a lonely person, as the head of the huge royal industry, he will also follow up on the development of the world situation in a timely manner, although he has not seen it, but he has also heard of what the railway is.

However, it was only after hearing about him that he was surprised, and the construction of railways in this era was basically the same as the construction of high-speed railways and nuclear power plants in later generations, all of which were super-large projects, and the funds required were massively calculated.

Although the royal industry is said to have many industries, in fact, most of the assets are major enterprises, that is to say, most of them are fixed assets, and their own liquid cash is not much.

If you want to build a railway, hundreds of thousands of yuan will not be heard when thrown out, and millions of tens of millions will be able to achieve initial results.

Now when he heard Lin Zhe say that he wanted to build a railway, he couldn't help but be stunned!

"Railway, the minister has also heard of this kind of object, but the minister also knows from many foreigners that it costs a lot of money to build the railway, and I am afraid that it will be difficult to support it with the financial resources of the finance department!"

Lin Zhe waved his hand and said: "I didn't let you build a long railway, only a small railway from the mining area to the canal, this railway is a transportation weapon, and it is of great benefit to the people's livelihood of the empire, and try to build a section in Xuzhou to see the effect!" ”

Lin Zhe didn't give Pan Lixuan any chance to explain or excuse himself, he directly decided the matter, and Pan Lixuan could only bow his head and respond.

Jun didn't joke, since Lin Zhe said this with such certainty, he naturally made up his mind, and Pan Lixuan didn't have any possibility of refutation.

On the way back, Pan Lixuan kept thinking, how should this railway be built? I don't know how much it will cost, and if it costs too much, it will be difficult to sustain the working capital of the royal family industry itself, so will it be possible to directly ask the Royal Bank to provide loans, or will it raise funds from the private sector?

Since Lin Zhe, the emperor, has decided to build a small railway, even if Pan Lixuan has to make one for Lin Zhe, as for how to solve it with technology and funds, Lin Zhe doesn't care, and he, Pan Lixuan, will be responsible for solving all these things.

That night, Pan Lixuan convened several major subordinates of the Finance Department of the Palace Affairs Department to discuss the construction of the Xuzhou Coal Mine and the transportation railway, and discussed how to raise funds for a night, but he did not think of a good way.

Just when Pan Lixuan was worried about how to raise funds to build the Xuzhou coal mine and railway, on the side of Wusong Fort, Bing Qusong and other senior generals of the Chinese Army were also paying close attention to the coalition forces in the distance.

In their sight, a large number of coalition soldiers began to leave the camp, where were they going? Go south to Wusong Fort or north to Jiangyin? (To be continued......)