Reborn as King of South America

Chapter 344 Patagonia Development

In the Jianji Hall of the Daming Palace, Li Mingyuan was sitting in front of the palace, with several personal guards standing beside him and nearly a hundred officials and generals sitting below him.

"After the founding of the empire, the old rules must be changed. Officials should address each other by their titles. No more titles like sir."

Li Mingyuan stared at the officials below and continued, "Reform and innovation are related to the country's development plan. All the bad habits and bad rules of the backward era must be eradicated. At the same time, the land immigration policy is the foundation of national stability and cannot be shaken. Officials at all levels of the central and local governments must strictly deal with those involved in illegal occupation of land. For those new landlords who are stubborn in their thinking, collude with officials and businessmen to embezzle national land, or whose land area exceeds the prescribed upper limit and who fail to pay the land value-added tax on time, they should be investigated and punished, and those who should be exiled should be exiled. The country has been established for more than ten years. Although the number of citizens is slightly insufficient, it does not need some termites that undermine the country's development."

Clans and the old landlord class are the biggest obstacles to the development of industrialization. In the late Qing Dynasty, the Westernization Movement in mainland China was slow to show results, which had a lot to do with the conservative landlords who occupied the main local resources.

The old landlords only knew how to replace money and property with land. They were bent on expanding the area of ​​land and using the land to exploit hired farmers. They had no thoughts or ideas about developing an industrial economy. A large amount of idle social funds were confined to the land. Even if the government wanted to develop the national economy, it lacked the necessary start-up funds. In addition, under the strict prevention and control of the late Qing government, the people were civilized and rebelled. Therefore, the Westernization Movement became a tool for corruption among the Eight Banners nobles, officials and gentry from the very beginning, and it was impossible to achieve the desired results.

The Han Kingdom was newly established on foreign territory. New immigrants from the same region were usually dispersed and arranged in different settlements, which to a certain extent blocked the development of clan power. However, the old Chinese habit of relying on land had not been fundamentally corrected in just ten years.
Almost all Chinese families who immigrated earlier and became wealthy have purchased five to six hundred acres of prime arable land. There are also many families whose total arable land, forest land, pasture land, and other types of land exceed the national land ownership limit. However, due to the influence of old customs, the emerging landlords who own five to six hundred acres or two to three thousand acres of land still want to obtain more land. Moreover, for the land area that exceeds the national limit, many people try their best to evade taxes. Local governments deal with no less than seven to eight hundred land-related tax evasion cases every year.

It is unlikely to expect the emerging landlords to abide by national regulations, voluntarily return the excess land or pay taxes according to the land area. Therefore, at the national government level, we should strengthen the intensity and strength of enforcement, continue to strengthen the handling and supervision of similar cases, and then, in the initial stage, with the government as the main body, establish a mixed industrial system with state-owned heavy industrial enterprises as the main body and private light industrial enterprises as the auxiliary, gradually reverse the incorrect concept of land among the people, and on the basis of each farmer owning a piece of land of moderate size, attract their energy to the direction of industrial and commercial development, and promote the national economy to remain healthy and stable.

"Your Majesty, the officials stationed in various prefectures and counties by the Inspectorate and the Ministry of Security are preparing to carry out the second phase of the purge in accordance with your Majesty's instructions. I believe that after a year of comprehensive purges, the local officialdom and economy will be greatly improved."

"There must be no relaxation in the campaign to clean up the bureaucracy."

Li Mingyuan nodded and said, "After the second phase of the rectification operation begins, the Ministry of Personnel, the Ministry of Revenue and other departments and agencies will also send some officials to various local counties to assist the Inspectorate and the Ministry of Security in their investigations."

"Yes, Your Majesty, I will cooperate wholeheartedly with the Inspectorate and the Ministry of Security in their investigation and evidence collection."

The ministers of the Ministry of Personnel and the Ministry of Revenue made a joint statement.

"We must continue to clean up the bureaucracy and investigate illegal land occupation and tax evasion, and we must not relax on other development issues."

Li Mingyuan ordered his attendants to take out a huge map and hang it on the west wall of the palace, explaining, "Before the Argentine War, the government discovered a number of large and medium-sized mining areas such as gold, copper, and iron in northern Wuzhou and Congo. However, the country was weak at the time, and in order to avoid interference and embezzlement by powerful countries in the mining areas, they had to be sealed up first.

Now that the situation in the local area has stabilized, the Corrales Mine in Wuzhou can start mining. The troops stationed in the Patagonia region recently received news that several gold and silver mines were discovered in Jinzhou (Santa Cruz Province). I have sent people to explore and verify. If the reserves of the gold and silver mines found meet the mining standards, it is appropriate to send some engineers and militia to assist in mining. "Patagonia is vast and sparsely populated. When the government organized immigration, few people were willing to live there. Now that the Patagonia garrison has discovered several gold and silver mines in Shouzhou, it is better to spread this news and attract people to move to Shouzhou, Jinzhou, Xizhou and other remote areas in the south."

Minister of the Ministry of Revenue Zhang Guanghai suggested.

“Gold and silver mines alone are not enough. If we want people to stay in Patagonia for a long time, we must choose the right area for immigrants to live.”

Li Mingyuan paused for a moment, recalling Ye Chenglin's report on the natural environment of various regions in Patagonia, and then pointed to several points on the map with a pointer in his right hand and said, "In the central and southern regions of Patagonia south of the Negro River, the rainfall is gradually decreasing, and there are many deserts and red cliffs. The areas available for immigrants to live are mainly distributed in coastal areas. Under current conditions, the inland areas that are more suitable for immigrants to live in are several settlements established by Argentines in the early years.

San Carlos, Esquel, Las Plumas, Las Nues, San Julian, and El Calafate near Lake Argentino. These six settlements have a moderate natural environment and have water sources, grasslands and other resources suitable for immigrants to live and work. They can serve as the first resettlement bases for inland Patagonia immigrants.

The pointer moves to the right, pointing to the coastal area on the Atlantic side of the Patagonia region.

"The waters around Puerto Blanca, Viedma, Rawson, and Deseado extend all the way to the Falkland Islands in the north of Tierra del Fuego, which are rich in fishery resources. As early as 1832, the Americans clashed with the Argentines on the Falkland Islands in order to poach local fishery resources. The Americans burned down the immigrant settlements built by the Argentines on the islands and sent warships to the coastal areas of Argentina for provocation and escort, which led to the failure of the Argentines' attempt to occupy the Falkland Islands.

According to the seized data, before 1878, the total amount of fishery products caught by Argentines in Patagonia was about 1.7 tons per year. If the amount illegally caught by Uruguay, the United States, Brazil and other countries is added, the annual output of fishery products in the Atlantic coastal area of ​​Patagonia should be more than 2 tons.

Fishery products are an important export resource for the country. A few months ago, because the government was busy taking over the remaining forces of Argentina, it had no energy to interfere with fishing activities along the coast of Patagonia, which led to American and Brazilian fishing boats entering and leaving the coastal areas at will and illegally fishing.
However, from now on, we can no longer sit idly by and watch other countries engage in illegal fishing. People in the southern part of our country who are willing to migrate and people who move in from the mainland and Southeast Asia must be resettled in coastal and inland settlements in Patagonia as soon as possible, so that the Chinese population will have an absolute advantage in the area.

At the same time, the Navy dispatched some warships and offshore escort vessels to patrol the Patagonian waters regularly. If they found foreign fishing boats illegally fishing, they would immediately capture or expel them to protect the fishery resources in the offshore areas of the country from being damaged by other countries.

"Your Majesty, what should we do if we encounter a British merchant ship?"

"We will treat them equally. However, if the behavior of British merchant ships is not too extreme, we will try to expel them to avoid escalating the situation and causing retaliation from the British."

(End of this chapter)