The journey starts from the Titanic

Well, this is on a boat bound for Shanghai.

Chapter 95

In December 1919, it was freezing.Time is like an old man who is suddenly slowing down. Looking back at the past, he can't bear to say goodbye to the past, but he still wants to leave.

The William departed from Guangzhou and after a short stop in Hong Kong, it continued to head north.

Standing on the trestle bridge, Situ Nan looked at the fading Victoria Harbour, feeling a little bit in his heart, and sighed: "It's another departure season."

"Victoria Harbour is so beautiful, it makes me intoxicated every time. Hong Kong, this small island is a place of gold with Asian wealth."

He Yongyuan looked at the wide and calm waters in front of him, the ships passing by, couldn't help but sigh.He held a document in his hand about the report that Meihua Company won the reclamation project in Causeway Bay, Hong Kong.

"Boss, this is a report from the Hong Kong branch of Meihua Company. They plan to invest one million yuan in two years to reclaim 10 acres.

At that time, the newly acquired land will also be owned by us. We will build our own warehouses and docks to do shipping business or re-export business.After gaining a foothold in Causeway Bay, we have the confidence to compete with Jardine Matheson."He Yongyuan said excitedly.

Earlier, Hong Kong’s Causeway Bay Jardines & Co., Ltd. dominated the entire Bay Area with its docks and warehouses. Every year, a large number of cargoes were transshipped into the Mainland through the Causeway Bay docks, occupying a large share of Hong Kong’s re-export business.

Naturally, this treasure of geomantic omen cannot be enjoyed exclusively by Yihe.Not only Meihua, but also Jardine's old adversary, Taikoo International, is eyeing on the opposite side of Victoria Harbour, always wanting to enter the fertile land of Causeway Bay.

"Yeah. I see, let them be alright!" Situ Nan nodded, responded, and cast his eyes to the sea again.

Meihua’s investment in Hong Kong will not excite Stuart too much, because Hong Kong is not as prosperous as it was later, it is just an excellent port, without manufacturing, and it is not yet a financial center. Although under British rule, financial The development is not bad, but the economic potential is not as good as Shanghai, Guangzhou, Tianjin and other places in the next few decades.

Therefore, Situ Nan will not place too much emphasis on this "Pearl of the Orient", which will only be fully radiant for a long time.

Situ Nan's plain attitude caused He Yongyuan to stagnate, thinking: The boss is indeed the boss, compared with Situ's calmness, he was just jumpy and frivolous.

He Yongyuan glanced at Situ Nan secretly and found that Situ Nan was facing the sea, not knowing what he was thinking, his mind seemed to be no longer here.Well, the person is standing in front of you, but you cannot feel his soul.

"What is he thinking?" He Yongyuan asked in his heart.As Situ Nan's new assistant, he must fully understand Situ Nan and win the trust of the boss with his superior performance.

The sea breeze grinned, bringing the cold and moist moisture in the depths of the ocean, like a vicious force, slowly permeating the human body.

This southern winter is really cold!Bitterly cold!

When He Yongyuan felt that he was almost hard, Situ Nan "woke up".

I saw him pointing at the sea, his eyes confident and firm, and he said loudly: "If you see it, the sea will be our new fertile land in the future, and we will ask for food from the sea!"

Situ Nan suddenly made He Yongyuan something inexplicable, but he nodded easily.

"In fact, you can organize a fleet to fish in the South Pacific. You can get enough fish meat, expensive whale oil, and cultivate the courage of the navy!" Situ Nan murmured, he was talking about whaling.

"Boss, this is a bit unreasonable, right?" He Yongyuan couldn't keep up with Situ Nan's thinking.

He didn't know that Situ Nan was thinking about food just now!He didn't even know that before Situ Nan left Guangzhou, he did a ugly business, which was the food business.

The matter had to go back a week ago, when He Yongyuan had not yet met Situ Nan.

Guangzhou.Situ Nan Mansion.A mature and stable man in his forties walked into Situ Nan's study.

"Master Situ, this is the situation of Nanhua Grain Company in recent years. I have sorted it out." Liu Chengmin handed an account book to Situ Nan, his face solemn.

There is no doubt that this is an invisible account book, which records in detail the operations of Nanhua Grain Bank over the past few years.

"Lao Liu, you have worked hard!" Situ Nan looked at Liu Chengmin's calm face and nodded inwardly.He opened the account book casually, looked at it, closed it again, and said to Liu Chengmin, "Leave the account book here first, I'll look at it later, you probably talk about the situation of the grain bank."

"Okay." Liu Chengmin seemed to have expected Situ Nan to ask this. As the general manager of Nanhua Grain Company, no one is more familiar with the situation of the Grain Industry.

"According to your instructions, last year, I registered Nanhua Grain Bank in Hong Kong with a registered capital of 500,000. Meihua Company owns 95% of the shares. Thanks to Master Situ, I also hold 5% of the shares..."

Liu Cheng gave Situ Nan a sensitive glance and continued, "Before the establishment of Nanhua Grain, Meihua's grain business in Guangzhou had already been quite effective, accounting for 10% of Guangzhou’s food and 20% of Hong Kong’s food. The market also opened branches in Shanghai and began to squeeze into Shanghai’s grain market."

This is the situation when the Nanhua Food Company was first established in 1918.After Liu Chengmin took over, the independent Nanhua Grain Company has developed rapidly. Taking advantage of the favorable opportunities that European grain merchants have no time to take care of, Nanhua Grain Company has rapidly expanded in Guangdong, Guangdong, Jiangsu and Zhejiang provinces with its strong strength. The local grain market has a firm foothold.

"...Now our Nanhua Grain Bank not only opened its own food banks in coastal cities such as Guangzhou, Shanghai, Xiamen, Ningbo, but also established branches in the inland cities such as Nanchang, Changsha, Hankou, etc., with a total of more than 20 branches and assets of 1,500. Ten thousand yuan, occupying 9% of the grain market in several southern provinces.

And with the expansion of business, it is expected that this proportion will reach 12% in five years!By then, the assets of Nanhua Grain Bank will also double..."

Speaking of this, Liu Chengmin's face is fascinating.Although according to the consistent style of the Meihua Consortium, making low-key money, the powerful grain merchant of Nanhua Grain Company is not familiar to the world, but every time Liu Chengmin thinks that he can be the largest grain merchant in China, he can't help but feel proud. , Although he rarely expresses such emotions.

Liu Chengmin couldn't help but glanced at Situ Nan secretly, and found that Situ Nan's face was faint, as if he was thinking about something.

Well, it didn't seem to have the pride or the proud expression that I had imagined, but rather a little mysterious, which made the proud look that Liu Chengmin had just given back immediately.

"Very good, the development of Nanhua Grain Bank is really good, better than I expected."

Situ Nan came back to his senses and said in his heart: Nanhua Group holds a large number of high-quality goods in their hands. In this seemingly dim era, it is not too difficult to open the market.

In Situ Nan's impression, the situation in the countryside seems to be terrible, and he wants to know about the situation in the countryside.He asked, "By the way, how is the situation in the countryside now? I heard that many farmers are bankrupt?"

After speaking, Situ Nan frowned slightly, waiting for Liu Chengmin's answer.

Where did Liu Chengmin go to the countryside?However, when he is engaged in food business, he naturally understands the situation in the countryside. He thought about it for a moment and organized the vocabulary: "The situation in the countryside is not satisfactory. There are many flour and wine factories in the cities, and the demand for food has also increased a lot. As far as I know, after the Republic of China, some new agricultural technologies were introduced from abroad, and some places tried to apply chemical fertilizers, so the grain yield per mu increased.

In places like Hunan and Jiangxi, today’s summer grain output is good. We have purchased more than 1.5 million tons of grain from various places. Together with the grain imported from Nanyang and the United States, it is expected that our market share will further increase in the future.

However, there were also disasters in some places, resulting in poor production and local food shortages.In some places, rural areas have gone bankrupt under the exploitation of natural disasters, landlords, and the government, and they are on the verge of collapse, which also offset the increase in grain production.

Farmers who lack food have to sell their land before entering the city to earn a living.Some of them were sent to Nanyang to make a living by the fleet organized by Meihua Company.

What's worse is that some warlords are really outrageous in the government. It is a pity that they not only set up exorbitant taxes and taxes, but also let farmers grow opium and turn their fertile fields into tobacco fields for personal gain.

This trend is spreading, spreading from places such as Jehol and Shaanxi in the north to the south, and some tobacco fields have also appeared in major grain-producing provinces such as Hunan and Jiangxi... Therefore, the total grain output is on a downward trend. Not a good thing!"

Liu Chengmin frowned. Although the development of Nanhua Grain Bank is getting better and better, the situation of China's agriculture makes him a little worried.

"Not satisfactory? It is not satisfactory!" Situ Nan nodded and sighed, "This is not something we can change, is it? We only need to do what we need to do, and don't be ignorant of our conscience."

Although China is a large food producing country, it is burdened by 400 million people. No amount of food is enough, so China will always be short of food.

These words will still apply after a hundred years, let alone the dark and bleak years of the Republic of China?

As a traditional farming nation, China’s land development reached its peak in the Song Dynasty. The Song Dynasty was also the most developed period of ancient China’s commodity economy. Unfortunately, under the southern invasions of the northern nomads, the budding capitalism that had finally developed was lost. Destroyed.

As for the later Yuan, Ming and Qing Dynasties, it was far behind the Song Dynasty.The so-called Kang-Qian heyday is nothing more than Man Qing putting gold on his face.

In short, in the cycle of peasant uprisings, then the establishment of new dynasties, land annexation, and peasant uprisings, in fact, too many people are constrained in limited land, and backward agricultural technology alone cannot produce enough. Food, so it will reincarnate again and again.

Food is the heaven for the people, and the dynasty of grain production relations rose and fell.The feudal dynasty always paid attention to food production, but did not know that shoveling in the land would never satisfy the ever-expanding population, so it could only consume the excess population through wars and turmoil.

This is a cruel fact.

Ok!The Republic of China is also short of food!To some extent, the turbulent society has also caused the effect of consuming too many people.

Terrible food!