After the first year of Qingli, the Great Song Dynasty officially entered the stage of recuperation.

The imperial court reduced forced labor, reduced taxes, relaxed commercial policies, and abolished the sales system, allowing agriculture and commerce to develop rapidly.

At the same time, the imperial court bled largely, allowing the local government to withhold 30% of the tax for development and construction, and also established schools, confiscated the land of illegal landlords and leased it to the common people, abolished iron money, and built rivers and water conservancy facilities.

For example, in the second year of Baoyuan, Zhao Jun ordered Wang Yao, the transfer envoy of Jinghu South Road, and Fan Shidao, the transfer envoy of Guangnan East Road, to cooperate in dredging and expanding the Ling Canal, and the first round of construction was completed in the first year of Kangding.

The completion of this project employed 2,000 people, a total of 60,850 workers, and more than 50,000 yuan. All materials are allocated by the three counties of Xing'an, Lingui and Lingchuan. The method of "burning stones to attack, both leading and opening" was adopted to remove the reefs that hinder boats in the canal, and the number of steep gates in the spiritual canal was increased to 36.

In the first year of Qingli, the imperial court allocated more than 500,000 yuan, mobilized more than 8,000 people, and employed more than 300,000 workers, expanded the Lingqu river, strengthened the embankment along the coast of more than 100 miles, greatly increased the amount of flood discharge and shipping, communicated Hunan and Guangdong, and laid the foundation for the commercial and trade activities between Guangdong and Hunan and Hubei.

In addition, in the first year of Kangding, the imperial court repaired the Bianhe River again, mobilized the people along the river to participate, in order to consolidate the embankment and use the Bianshui to wash the sand in the river, 600 miles of wooden pillars were laid on both sides of the Bianhe River, and the Bianhe River was narrowed to the point that the sand could be washed away, and the Bianhe River was ready to "harness the water and attack the sand".

In fact, although there were still seven years before the Yellow River burst, the Song Dynasty government had already begun preparations, starting from the fourth year of Jingyou, the imperial court successively allocated funds to clean the tributaries on both sides of the middle and lower reaches of the Yellow River.

The problem of the Yellow River is actually soil erosion in the upper reaches, resulting in too much sand in the water, and the various tributaries are slowly blocked, and once it encounters a flood, the Yellow River will explode in an instant, due to the accumulation of silt, the water will break through the river, and then spread and flood, eventually causing the middle and lower reaches of the region to become a flood.

Therefore, in ancient times, there was a saying that the Yellow River should be governed first and the sand should be controlled.

At present, Zhao Jun plans to grasp it with three hands, taking advantage of the fact that the war is going well now, and he has not fought for five or six years like in history, resulting in the emptiness of the Great Song Dynasty treasury, first combing the various canals in the middle and lower reaches of the Yellow River, and dredging the various branches.

This is much better than clearing the Yellow River sediment and digging a few more drainage canals, and the cleared silt can be used as soil for the fields on both sides.

Then it is to install wooden pillars and piles in the lower reaches of the Bianhe River and the lower reaches of the Yellow River, wait until a season when the water flow is low, cast dikes on the Yellow River and Bianhe and other large rivers, hoard the water flow, and wait for the dikes to be built, and then blow up the dikes with gunpowder, and suddenly discharge the water and wash the sand.

The last method is naturally to dig and build a flood channel, and these three methods will go down and work together to ensure that the Yellow River is honest.

Why do you want money!

These three methods are already the most cost-effective.

However, according to the budget estimate of the Ministry of Finance, I am afraid that hundreds of thousands of people will have to be mobilized, and the amount of work is huge, and I am afraid that it will cost tens of millions of yuan.

Although this money can save some military spending, "six points of the world's things, five points to raise soldiers".

Even Zhao Jun has not yet attacked the gold-swallowing beast of redundant army for the time being, let alone save some military spending.

So at present, it is still like before the real start of the Qingli New Deal, only do the preliminary preparations, spend a little money first, and then take it step by step.

At least now the Yellow River has left them for seven years, which is enough time to do a lot of things.

At the end of August, Cao Miaoxin gave birth to a big fat boy.

Zhao Zhen was very happy and named him Zhao Tan, and was accepted by Zhao Jun.

This is next to the word Japanese, the same as Zhao Fang.

After getting the name recognized, Zhao Zhen was even more happy, and he was a little carried away when he was happy, and actually proposed to accept him as a righteous son at the daily meeting of Chongzheng Palace, which almost didn't make Zhao Jun roll his eyes.

Boy.

His generation is estimated to be more than 30 generations shorter in the family tree, if his son is accepted as a righteous son by Zhao Zhen, then he is the same generation as Song Yingzong and Zhao Shu, which is simply the opposite of Tiangang.

Later, Zhao Zhen remembered this matter under Yan Shu's reminder, and hurriedly regretted that it seemed that it would not work to accept him as a righteous son.

However, to be reasonable, Zhao Jun's son is the nephew of Queen Cao, so he has also become Zhao Zhen's nephew, and the generation is still a bit chaotic.

Fortunately, this nephew is a cousin, but even so, it made Zhao Zhen very excited, and finally tried his best to dispel public opinion and was named the Marquis of Xiangfu County, which shocked the Manchu officials and wrote to dissuade them.

Many people think that the Song Dynasty was not knighted, but in fact it was sealed, for example, the prime minister and the envoy were often crowned as the prince of the country, even if they were not sealed during their lifetime, they would be posthumously crowned after death, and there were even posthumously crowned kings, such as Cao Cong's brother Cao Xi was posthumously crowned King Wu.

But in most people's impressions, it is a fact that the Northern Song Dynasty did not have many knights. A large number of knighthoods were mainly concentrated in the early years of the Northern Song Dynasty and the Huizong period of the Song Dynasty, and only the prime minister was knighted during the Song Renzong period.

Including giving Zhao Jun the title of Song Guogong is already very shocking, although he is the head of the prime minister, it is normal to be crowned Guogong.

But before he came, the officials didn't know him, and they didn't know who he was at all.

Second, this is Song Guogong.

If ordinary princes such as Qi Guogong and Wei Guogong would think about it.

Ordinary officials and clans generally do not have titles, such as marquises, earls, viscounts, barons, etc., which were almost extinct before Song Huizong.

Now that Zhao Jun's son is suddenly knighted, of course everyone opposes it.

Although Zhao Jun has also been the head of the prime minister for five or six years and seems to have accumulated a lot of prestige, there are many people in the court who are dissatisfied with him, and there are not a few imperial historians and officials who often impeach him, but Zhao Zhen and Zhao Jun are just the wind in their ears.

Now it's just another wave.

They're all used to it.

Just ignore it.

Under this wave of opposition, there was almost no wind and waves, and Zhao Tan became the only county marquis to be sealed since the founding general.

And the time slowly came to the end of the second year of Qingli.

From the beginning of the new deal in February to the autumn tax in the second half of the year, what is surprising is that although the agricultural tax is lower than before, only more than 5 million, the commercial tax has increased a lot, reaching more than 33 million, of which about 19 million is commercial tax and levy, and the other 16 million is foreign trade.

You must know that according to historical records, the foreign trade income of the Southern Song Dynasty accounted for only about 6 percent of the finance, and the total annual income of the Southern Song Dynasty was about 100 million to 160 million guan, which basically remained between 6 million and 10 million guan.

Among them, Guangzhou and Quanzhou are the mainstays, with a total income of more than 2 million yuan.

The combined income of more than 20 ports such as Mingzhou, Hangzhou, Wenzhou, Jiangyin, and Xiuzhou is only a few million, which is far from today's Northern Song Dynasty.

But the two are quite different.

First, the Southern Song Dynasty only counted the port trade income, not the land trade income with Jin, Dali, Western Xia and other countries.

Second, during the Southern Song Dynasty, Japan had not yet discovered silver mines, and it was difficult to start a huge trade with the Great Song Dynasty.

Now the Great Song Dynasty not only did foreign trade business in Central Asia, but also launched five trade routes with Liao, Xixia and Dali at the same time, and sent envoys to Central Asia to communicate more with Arab merchants in Central Asia and encourage maritime trade between the two sides.

Therefore, since last year, the growth of seaborne trade has increased significantly.

The income of Guangzhou and Quanzhou alone reached more than 3 million yuan, and the annual trade volume with Japan soared to 40 million taels of silver, which was eight times the original amount, and also brought about 4 million taels of silver to the imperial court.

In this way, counting the ports of other cities, the annual shipping trade in the second year of Qingli basically had an income of nearly 10 million yuan, reaching the highest level in the Southern Song Dynasty in history.

Moreover, the Southern Song Dynasty did not deepen communication with Central Asia, nor did it discover Japanese silver mines, and 10 million yuan of income was the limit.

Now is not the limit, with the increase in trade volume, the annual import and export of hundreds of millions of yuan, just the tax can reach 10 million or 20 million is a very possible thing, so it can be said that the current marine trade is booming, the future can be expected.

In addition to maritime trade, the Silk Road, the Ancient Tea Horse Road, and the trade of the Liao Song Dynasty and the Xia and Song Dynasties also soared, and last year the Liao Kingdom alone imported 800,000 catties of sulfur from the Great Song Dynasty.

Because the Great Song Dynasty set up trade transit stations on Jeju Island and Tsushima Island, and encouraged merchants to trade more in Japan, the books, handicrafts, porcelain, and tea of the Great Song Dynasty were almost rushed out in Japan.

Japan's sulfur, copper, and iron were also about to be robbed by the Great Song Dynasty merchants.

Then the merchants of the Great Song Dynasty did not return to the Song Kingdom at all, reported and replenished water and food on Jeju Island, and sailed directly to Mizhou City in Shandong, and after reporting and replenishing supplies in Mizhou City, they were pulled to Qianfu County.

Qianfu County, which was later the city of Huanghua in Hebei Province, was where the Great Song Dynasty set up a port, mainly for bulk trade with the Jurchens in the Northeast and the Liao State.

The Great Song merchants transported the sulfur brought from Japan here, and then transported it north by land to Nigu Village on the border of the Liao and Song Dynasties, probably in the area of Tianjin in the later generations, and sold it to the Liao State in the border area of the two sides.

This middleman made a lot of money, almost directly from Japan, labeled as the Song State, and pulled to the border of the Liao State to sell.

In this case, the agriculture and economy in the Great Song Dynasty can be said to have improved rapidly, and the economic circulation has grown explosively, although the Audit Bureau has not yet given growth data, but just looking at the tax can understand how fast the business is growing.

As a result, the autumn tax of the Great Song Dynasty this year has reached 39 million guan, which is more than 2 million guan higher than this year's summer tax, and the total tax revenue is about 76 million guan.

This figure is still much worse than last year, about 25 million less, and compared with previous years, it is about 30 million less.

Because since the fourth year of Jing You, Zhao Jun has been generating income for the imperial court.

Cracking down on corruption, confiscating all the property of corrupt officials and corrupt officials, selling state-owned assets, reforming tea mountains and salt works, and so on.

Especially in the latter two, a large number of tea mountains and salt farms were privatized, allowing private businessmen to participate in a large number of shares, putting an end to the corruption of the previous state-owned farms, and bringing more than 10 million yuan of income to the imperial court every year.

But with the national agricultural tax cut by two-thirds, this is clearly much more than expected.

Zhao Jun's initial vision of the five major trade routes is considered to be the beginning of the force, this year's total foreign trade income is about 27 million guan, the sea trade is close to the peak level of the Southern Song Dynasty 10 million guan, land trade reached 17 million guan, the growth can be described as gratifying.

Although the restructuring of domestic commerce has made it easier to evade taxes, it cannot stand the ferocity of the tax army. The imperial court mobilized local army and forbidden army, more than 200,000 people in the country, plus more than 100,000 imperial city divisions to form a law enforcement force.

In almost every county, the county government, the State Taxation Bureau, and the Imperial History Department strictly grasp taxes, and once they are caught evading taxes, they will confiscate the goods and impose a fine of a certain amount. The worst is the confiscation of all property, and there is also the risk of imprisonment.

For a time, the merchants were in the limelight, and except for a few who took risks, the vast majority of merchants paid their taxes honestly and became honorable taxpayers.

In fact, Zhao Jun wanted to exile all the criminals to Taiwan at this time, so as to open up Taiwan.

Although since the beginning of the Three Kingdoms Soochow, our country has been involved in Taiwan.

However, at that time, Taiwan was full of miasma and dense forests, and a large number of people needed to cut down trees and open up the plains before they could gradually become suitable for human survival.

Most of the indigenous Gaoshan people in Taiwan also migrated slowly from the Baiyue period of the Qin and Han dynasties, but the number is small and there is no advanced production experience, so they have been maintaining the tribal life of Ru Mao and drinking blood.

Therefore, it was not until the end of the Southern Song Dynasty that the Mengyuan Dynasty approached, and a large number of Han people moved to Taiwan, bringing advanced technology, production tools, forging technology, etc., which made Taiwan a little more populated, and finally was easily taken over by the Mengyuan Dynasty, and the Xuanfu Division was set up here and incorporated into the territory of our country.

So from this point of view, it is basically a matter of ease for Zhao Jun to send a ship over and a few more officials to declare Taiwan an inalienable territory of our country.

In fact, not only Taiwan, but also Australia.

But it's useless for you to declare it.

There's got to be someone up there.

As for some primitive tribes, what's the use of your declaration?

Just like Lingnan has also been reclaimed by generations of criminals who have been assigned to Lingnan, this method is actually quite effective.

But in the end, Zhao Jun still dispelled this idea.

The main thing is that the mortality rate is too high.

I am afraid that I will not save one out of ten and spend a lot of manpower and material resources, but the result is not very good.

It is better to wait for the productivity to improve in the future, spread the land into the mu, and after the explosive growth of the population, and then send a large number of people to develop, it is much stronger than taking human lives to pile up now.

This year, the Great Song Dynasty was not smooth, but because of the existence of the New Deal, the people's lives were much better.

In this year, business restrictions were relaxed, tax models were changed, and private commerce became more prosperous, and the number of people engaged in commercial activities increased day by day.

In this year, the internal and foreign affairs of the Great Song Dynasty were stable, and it had frequent trade with merchants from Western Xia, Liao, Japan, Goryeo, Tubo, Dali, and Central Asian countries, and the export volume soared.

In this year, the Great Song Dynasty built canals, built civil engineering, built schools, promoted science education, and laid the foundation for mathematics, physics and chemistry from primary school to junior high school.

This year, Su Song, the new Jinshi, was very interested in the steam engine being studied by the research institute, and took the initiative to ask to be transferred to the research institute and join the scientific research.

In this year, the imperial court cast more than 200 bronze cannons, and began to invest in the research and development of firearms such as iron cannons and flintlock pistols.

In this year, Zhao Jun drew a circle in Handan City, Hebei Province, and asked to build a canal between Wu'an and Lishui, and then build a steel mill here, officially starting a large-scale steelmaking experiment.

In this year, as Jiaozipu has been established in major commercial cities across the country, a large number of merchants deposited copper coins into Jiaozipu for trade, and the imperial court used silver imported from Japan as anchors, gradually replacing copper coins, so that the shortage of money in the market gradually eased.

Although it is not completely solved, it is much better and promotes business development.

In the midst of this noise that is getting better and better.

The third year of Qingli is coming.

(End of chapter)