Chapter 261: Sell the pot and sell the iron
Whether it is development or war, in the minds of Chen Gong and others it is largely an economic account.
The deposit for taking Bingzhou was just money, food, and soldiers' pensions. Although it required an investment of nearly 20 billion, it was a one-time deal.
The subsequent population migration and construction are the big expenses, with one-time expenses alone being no less than 50 billion, and the subsequent continuous construction expenses are also not small.
After the war, more than 100 billion yuan was spent.
That's why Chen Gong insisted that he could only take Sili next year, and Yizhou couldn't be attacked at all. Because the battle line and supply line of attacking Yizhou were too long, and the cost would be several times more than that of taking Bingzhou.
Cheng Yu's suggestion to mobilize another eight million people to build water conservancy projects was also a calculation. Not only did he have to calculate the wages of these people, but he also had to calculate the money lost by taking these people out of the farming population.
Overall, although the cost is much less than that of capturing Yizhou, it will probably cost more than 200 billion coins, and every year.
This project is only the first phase of Tianze's plan. It will probably take three years with so much manpower.
Although it is very expensive, it does not seem unacceptable when you think that after it is built, the losses in conquering the grassland, Yizhou and Central Plains will be reduced by at least tens of billions of coins, and the overall output value of the people under the rule will also increase by hundreds of billions of coins.
If nothing goes wrong, the cost can be recovered in five or six years.
After all, the agricultural foundation under his rule is relatively good, the land is fertile and the grain yield is high.
Under normal circumstances, it might take 20 to 30 years or even longer to pay back the investment by developing a canal relying solely on agriculture. However, the yield per mu of "black soil" is two to three times that of ordinary fields, which can directly shorten this time by more than twice.
Moreover, the water network designed by Tian Ze had already taken into account issues such as the difficulty of construction, and made great use of the existing water veins. Coupled with relatively favorable conditions in terms of organization, tools, etc., the cost of developing the canal was greatly reduced.
Being able to recover the cost in such a short time, Chen Gong and others could not help but be tempted. They would make a profit every year thereafter, which was much more than what they could make from ordinary private loan sharks, and the scale was so huge.
Chen Gong never hesitated about whether to do it or not. He was willing to sell everything he had to do it. The only problem was whether his family's financial resources could sustain it.
After calculating for a long time, Chen Gong really couldn't figure out the account.
We cannot save on basic expenditures, nor on expenditures on population birth incentives and military operations. Even if we use financial means to transfer a large amount of money from one hand to the other, the key problem is that food output will not keep up.
With a population of more than 43 million, there are too many children because of the birth incentives, and less than 40% of the young and strong people are able to work. Cheng Yu's suggestion of taking out another 20% of the people is actually equivalent to taking out more than half of the young and strong people.
"Impossible. At most we can take out 10% from the people, and..." Chen Gong finally sighed and looked at Tian Ze.
He was more eager than Cheng Yu to take on this huge project, and even wanted to get all the young and strong people to do it, but that was unrealistic.
"Even if we take out 10%, the number of people under our rule who can engage in farming will be less than 7 million."
"Although the soil under our rule is fertile, even if we adopt rough farming methods in some areas and even if most of the people involved in the construction do not fully work, there will inevitably be a huge food gap."
"With our current food storage, it won't last that long. People won't starve to death, but it will greatly affect the living standards of residents and cause unrest."
"But if the weather is right and the weather is good, maybe we can hold on."
Under no circumstances should the people’s current living standards be lowered. This was Chen Gong’s bottom line.
Looking at Chen Gong's hopeful eyes, Tian Ze understood, but his brows were furrowed, and he also started to think in his mind.
He understood what Chen Gong meant.
As his territory continued to expand, he used the Soil Moisturizing Technique more and more frequently, but rarely used the Spirit Rain Technique.
The reason is simple: the energy is not there.
In such a vast territory, except for the Northeast Plain, the cultivated land in other places is not connected in large pieces, but is scattered in small pieces of tens of thousands of acres. In the case that the application of the soil moistening technique already occupies a lot of energy, it would take more than a year to apply the spiritual rain technique to small pieces one by one.
The cultivated land area only accounts for about half of the total territory under Tianze's jurisdiction. If large tracts of it are released directly, it will actually be a loss.
Therefore, nowadays, Tianze basically casts the spell wherever there are signs of drought or flood, and rarely uses the spiritual rain spell on ordinary days.
The per-acre yield of the land under his rule is no longer as high as when he first started.
This is also one of the main reasons why Tian Ze has been thinking about the construction of water networks.
Chen Gong meant to ask Tian Ze whether he could use the Spirit Rain Technique on a large scale and with a certain frequency in the next two to three years to ensure that the grain production under his rule would increase by several percent.
But for Tian Ze, this is also an economic consideration.
He now has enough spiritual energy, but he still needs to consider how long it will take to make back the money he earned from such a lavish spending. This time span is probably about ten years.
"can!"
After thinking for a long time, Tian Ze nodded at Chen Gong.
Overall, he shouldn't lose money. And even if he did lose a little, he would accept it in order to quickly build this epic project that would benefit future generations.
After receiving Tian Ze's affirmation, Chen Gong immediately felt relieved and then became excited.
Such a huge project!
Unheard of in ancient times!
Ordinary people don’t even dare to think about it!
It is very likely to be realized in his hands!
And this was just the beginning. He had already planned to expand across the country, attacking, occupying, and building a state.
Once the world is unified, this project can be completed.
The subsequent fine-tuning and improvement can be carried out slowly and painstakingly, and the workload will no longer be so huge.
Being famous for generations is just a "small matter".
It’s exciting to think how powerful their rule will be by then.
Once it is truly successful, there will be a qualitative leap in all aspects including agriculture, commerce, transportation, and military!
Apart from anything else, it would take the army about half a year to march from Bingzhou to Yizhou, but if a complete water network is built and water transportation is used, it can arrive in more than a month!
The gap between the two is like heaven and earth.
At this moment, Chen Gong and others couldn't help but recall the world map that Tian Ze showed them.
If all the water networks under the jurisdiction were built according to this specification, it might be possible to expand the ruling territory several times again!
After all, when a country is strong enough, the biggest limitation that determines the scope of its rule is nothing more than the speed of information transmission, resource allocation, and the maximum distance the army can reach while ensuring logistics.
With a dense water network, these problems can be solved to a large extent.
Tian Ze also realized this at this time, but on the contrary, he also found an embarrassing problem.
He wanted more and more, and there were more and more things he had to consider in order to conquer other territories and unify the world, and the cost was getting higher and higher.
It seems like I'm digging a hole for myself, slowing down my progress.
(End of this chapter)
