I was reborn without dreams

Chapter 192 Uncle Zhang's Creative Ideas Continue
"Brother Li, do you think Director Zhang will make things difficult for me after he comes back from Jiangning?"

As his partner, Brother Li comforted Niu Zuo, saying, "Little Niu, don't worry, I'll make sure he doesn't get into trouble. You've been here for so long, don't you know what Director Zhang is like? He's petty as a needle."

"..."

Brother Li patted Niu Zuo on the shoulder and smiled without saying anything. However, Niu Zuo didn't reveal any bombshells. Director Jia's side was busy with their own people, which had nothing to do with their investigation team.

They're not from the same government department, so it doesn't matter!
Uncle Zhang, who had sped to Jiangning, got out of the car and stretched. His secretary in the passenger seat had been fast asleep, only waking up after spitting out a mouthful of drool.

It was already dark when I looked up, and in my drowsy state, I saw a burly man laughing and talking with the director.

"I heard from the old man that everyone in the village is saying that you killed a Japanese devil?"

"Nonsense! I went to invest in the World Cup, how could I possibly kill Japanese soldiers? It was a man named Hu Xianda."

"That's a traitor."

"..."

Uncle Zhang couldn't accept that his nephew had committed murder, but he had no choice but to accept it.

He was the only one in his family who had never killed anyone. He thought the next generation would live a good life, without having to live on the edge of a knife or face gunfire. But now, it seems the God of Literature has asked the God of War to cooperate with him.

Uncle Zhang, feeling somewhat frustrated, felt even more sorry for his cousin and his wife. He had finally managed to raise Zhang Da'an to adulthood, only to see him become increasingly abnormal, and he couldn't understand Zhang Da'an's current changes at all.

However, Uncle Zhang was still able to accept it.

On the contrary, the old man Zhang Qihong was quite calm. After all, the old man had actually killed people, so he didn't feel anything.

Uncle Zhang needs his nephew to kill a traitor to mentally prepare himself, otherwise he won't be able to sleep at all tonight.

Fortunately, it's a bit frustrating, but all you need is one large hairy crab weighing a little over a pound. The crabs aren't very fat at this time, but they're still edible. Along with the "crab king," there are only juvenile crabs that haven't mated yet, which can be steamed.

The drivers and secretaries all got a good meal. They didn't get to eat the "Crab King," but each of them got a large crab weighing seven or eight ounces.

Knowing that the uncle and nephew had something to talk about, they were both quite quick-witted and went to stay in the small private room.

"What do the people from Yuzhang Province want me to do?"

“I’ll have ‘Zhang’an Foods’ invest in a project to continue making jams and vinegars, but under their own brand; Fengyi County will make apple cider vinegar, apple juice, and apple jam, while Yuzhang Province will make orange juice and orange jam under one brand. In addition, we’ll set up a procurement platform for aquatic products and pollution-free vegetables, using you for promotion, so that local towns and villages in Yuzhang Province can have confidence.”

“Setting an example, I know. You can decide what to do, I can handle it.”

Uncle Zhang is still not very good at handling affairs, but he probably has obsessive-compulsive disorder. Once something is on his mind and has been filed, he will follow up on it every few days.

The county's organizational study meetings rarely involve empty talk, because he holds both positions and doesn't need to establish any unwarranted authority. Since the other members of the leadership team have all achieved results, no one has any objections, and they are convinced both outwardly and inwardly.

The reason for their conviction is simple: at the level of the "Five Giants of Chengguan Town," they often put themselves in others' shoes. They had also wondered if they would have given up their achievements for nothing if they were Zhang Zhengdong.

Taking women and children's work as an example, Chenzhuang Town has undergone tremendous changes, with the proportion of rural women participating in social labor rising sharply.

If this happened in the suburbs of Beijing or Tianjin, it would be enough to get someone on their radar, and given the right opportunity, it might lead to a "triple suicide."

Zhang Zhengdong didn't care at all. In his eyes, there was no such thing as women's and children's work. They were all the same, regardless of age, gender, health, or disability. They were all laborers.

Don't assume that children don't have to do chores. Schools also have labor experience courses. Super primary schools need super vegetable gardens. Each grade has its own vegetable garden. At most, older children help younger children with some chores.

I can't not do it; I'm growing vegetables for my own consumption.

If the cafeteria serves "chicken feather vegetables," which are small bok choy or cabbage seedlings, the cafeteria doesn't have hundreds of dedicated vegetable washers. Instead, the teachers and students do these tasks together.

Similarly, in Uncle Zhang's eyes, men and women are the same; how can they not work or go to work?
In places like sand and gravel plants, material storage yards, and brick kilns, a special "work point system" is implemented. The reason is simple: there are too many jobs on construction sites, and not everyone works only one job in one place. Rural families that come out to work often have two, three, or even more laborers.

It's not impossible to settle wages directly at this point, but as long as you don't need the money urgently, and you're moving between multiple construction sites, as long as they are still project sites or factories in the Pengcheng City Fengyi County Rural Poverty Alleviation and Prosperity Industrial Demonstration Park, then you can earn work points.

It doesn't matter if it's settled every ten days or every month, as long as it's a temporary or odd job, you can check your work points with your ID card. Regardless of whether you get paid or not, you'll receive a work point slip every ten days.

It wasn't that Zhang Zhengdong didn't want to make things clear, but in a poor township with over 60,000 people, how many people could be found who were good enough to keep accounts?

It's better to use the old, traditional methods.

Despite its seemingly rustic approach, the "work point management system" in the demonstration park makes everything crystal clear.

If you're a full-time employee, then this isn't suitable; you still have to receive a payslip.

Generally speaking, in the demonstration park at this time, men were treated like beasts, women like men, and the elderly and children were treated like half-humans.

As long as someone is human, they are a labor force and must do things and produce output.

If it were a different county magistrate, he would have been furious long ago, as his credibility is insufficient; the reason why Uncle Zhang's approach still garnered such a large following is mainly because he himself frequents the construction site every day.

He had personally eaten at the construction site canteen and he was convinced of its quality, a fact even the stingiest foreman acknowledged. In any case, the foreman would occasionally treat himself to a good meal and a couple of drinks.

Because Zhang Zhengdong had served in the army and was a "veteran squad leader," older veterans who were younger than him were also willing to work for him. The drivers of "Fengyi Drivers" were mainly veterans, with farmers from Chenzhuang Town as secondary drivers.

This operation has once again yielded results for the county officials in charge of this area.

In the past, the work of supporting the military and resettling veterans was just a matter of making a model and that was it; very few people actually made it onto the scale. Now it's completely different. In terms of scale, number of people involved, and efficiency, it's truly remarkable.

Even though Zhang Zhengdong himself didn't care, the person in charge of the work line dared not claim the credit for himself. He told the truth when he reported it, which was already considered as accepting it. But the city's commendation came unexpectedly, something he would never have dared to dream of before.

Starting this year, Fengyi County actually has dozens of natural and administrative villages that are qualified to be removed from the list of "impoverished villages," but Uncle Zhang is all-powerful and will destroy anyone who dares to remove the label.

The label of "impoverished village" used to be a disgrace, but back then, people had no choice but to rely on farming for a living.

Things are different now. We still find food in the fields, but we used to use hoes. Now, we use rotary tillers.

Can that be the same?

Another point is that in the past, farming only brought in 2,000 yuan a year, and most of that had to be spent; now, with two "Chenzhuang workers" in the family, they can save more than 20,000 to nearly 30,000 yuan a year. If they are generous enough to buy an appliance or something, they can still save 17,000 to 18,000 yuan.

At that time, the label of "impoverished village" was a very valuable thing.

With tax exemptions for starting businesses in "impoverished villages" and Uncle Zhang personally overseeing things, all the ridiculous levies have been swept away. So, which village cadre with a sound mind would be willing to make the village-run factory pay taxes?

Take Dafeng Pickles Factory in Shidikou Village as an example; that 16 million is pure profit!

If Shidikou Village were to go around showing off now, saying that our village has a surplus of over 20 million yuan this year...

Uncle Zhang can personally lead a group to stew all the stupid eggs in this village into turtle and dog meat soup.

While it might seem a bit stingy and even a bit like taking advantage of the government, Uncle Zhang had his reasons. After all, the village had already been labeled "impoverished" for so many years; what difference would a few more years make? I wasn't receiving any welfare...

You've eaten?
That's fine.

I won't pay taxes, but I still want to take welfare. Isn't that audacious?
This is why the team members, Lao Cai and Lao Xin, could stare at the investigators and agricultural technicians with eyes as sharp as snakes.

Although the approach of uniting all forces that can be united is rather unorthodox, the result... was still very good.

Anyway, Uncle Zhang is very confident now. He calls his best friend Liu Yuanshan to brag whenever he has a chance, saying that being a "county magistrate" isn't something to be taken lightly... He's working himself to the bone every day!
When his nephew Jingxian said he wanted to work with the people from Yuzhang Province, Uncle Zhang wasn't worried at all. He just stuck to one principle: he would do whatever he could get from his land and wouldn't care about anything else.

If you were to suggest placing an LCD panel factory in Fengyi County, Uncle Zhang really wouldn't care or want it.

Agricultural counties should focus on "agriculture." If agriculture can be industrialized, then the "industry" sector should also be agricultural and rural industries, not the other way around. Training a group of construction workers like the "Chenzhuang workers" was already incredibly difficult; without a complete education and training system, even regular industrial workers are completely unsuitable.

The current labor force level is sufficient. If we upgrade to the next stage, then a large portion of the qualified labor force will have to be cut. Comrade Zhang Zhengdong is just single-minded, not stupid.

"Now, my goal is to destroy all of the Hu family's businesses. Some of their businesses in the province, such as agriculture, forestry, fisheries, and animal husbandry, are not too difficult to manage. But to destroy their businesses in Yuzhang Province as well, and to stifle the Hu family in that area, we need to create confidence for the local agricultural production areas to establish sales channels."

"It's about winning over the farmers, livestock breeders, or farmers in Yuzhang Province, so they don't worry about not having food without the Hu family. Even if there's no Hu family, there's still the Zhang family, and there's still the country. There's nothing to be afraid of. I don't believe anyone has three heads and six arms. If we're going to fight, we'll fight to the end. Don't worry, I'll definitely do a good job as a model and example."

Uncle Zhang is now quite knowledgeable, and he's incredibly charismatic on this stage in Fengyi County.

In other words, it means being principled and able to withstand tests. If you replace it with someone who can't control their urges, they can sleep with all sorts of different women for miles around.

"Jiangning Agricultural University is giving me a master's degree, which is perfect timing. It's like a pillow being placed on a pillow when I'm sleepy. When they promote me, I'll be a highly educated intellectual. Hahahaha..."

"..."

Looking at Uncle Zhang's smug expression, Zhang Da'an was speechless.

However, he also admired Uncle Zhang quite a bit; the foreign language he had learned before actually came in handy in Fengyi County.

Of the entire leadership team, Zhang Zhengdong was the only one who was exceptionally skilled. He negotiated cooperation with the Koreans in English, exuding a high level of sophistication that even surprised Lao Cai, who was in charge of investment promotion.

We're all just country bumpkins, so why are you, a veteran, speaking foreign languages?
But that's not all. Among the radish products in Dafeng Pickles Factory's product line, there is a sweet pickled radish, which is sold in commercial barrels and bags specifically to Japanese companies in Chongzhou.

The Japanese soldiers were also surprised to see a local official who knew how to use vulgar language like "Kou Ni Ji Wa" for the first time, which startled Old Xin, who was taking a group photo with Uncle Zhang.

Why are Lao Cai and Lao Xin the most like venomous snakes in the leadership team? It's because Uncle Zhang is like a "mountain peak".

Now, Jiangning Agricultural University is giving him a master's degree. Although he is a current graduate student, his work is of high quality. His papers are not just any kind of low-quality work. He can produce more than a dozen excellent papers on the changes in Fengyi County and its current and future achievements in science, education, culture and health.

In other words, Uncle Zhang needs to become an official; otherwise, there would be no problem with Uncle Zhang going to teach at a university within three years, as per the agreement.

He has extensive practical experience and can freely exchange ideas with professors who study agriculture, rural areas, and farmers.

Others conduct research in depth, but Uncle Zhang is different; I am the data itself that is being researched.

That's just how awesome it is.

"Since you're prepared, Uncle, and understand the stakes, I won't waste any more words. Let's try to wipe out the entire Hu family outside of Yuzhang Province's core industries before the Lunar New Year."

"Will a fight break out? If it gets out of hand, someone will definitely come to mediate."

“Not this time. I can make full use of my abilities in the field of education. I have been given instructions from above. I am just a henchman.”

"Thugs?"

Uncle Zhang was confused now, and he asked curiously, "How high is it up there?"

"What do you think?"

"..."

Uncle Zhang shut his mouth, feeling that compared to his nephew, he was still too incompetent and not presentable.

However, he quite enjoyed the days when he could eat dog meat freely in Fengyi County, and his work was only difficult, not impossible.

It's much better than when I was at Dongweigang Middle School.

In the past, when they built an adobe playground for Dongweigang Middle School, they would have to go back to Wuxing Village to cheat and swindle people. Now it's different; people from all around are willing to be cheated.

When they called for people from Wuxing Village to come out for negotiations, it was mostly Zhang family members. In Fengyi County, it was different; they could bring in people from Peicheng County, Fangyu County, and Shanfu County.

They're much more assertive now.

It feels great to blend in with the masses.

Sometimes they really fight, and whoever loses becomes a...

It was bustling with activity and full of energy.

It's completely different from the undercurrents on my nephew's side; it's my nephew's side that's more frightening.

When swimming in the wild, I'm not afraid of big waves from boats, but I'm afraid of undercurrents.

"Hey, could we also start a seafood business while we're at it?"

Why are you still so obsessed with raising soft-shelled turtles?

"It's really good business. You don't know how popular it is in the countryside of southwestern Shandong and southeastern Henan. They kill turtles by the bucketful. It's really good business. I'm not lying to you."

"This kind of small business is really not very interesting. There isn't enough water in Fengyi County to raise many fish."

“I don’t plan to do anything big in Fengyi County.”

"What do you mean? You're not doing this in Fengyi County, so why are you still thinking about the aquatic product business?"

"That's right. Wholesalers, middlemen, and vendors of all sizes from the surrounding areas are now all willing to come to the newly built farmers' market. The volume is not small, with pork, dog, beef, mutton, chicken, duck, fish, shrimp... everything is available. The most interesting thing is the aquatic products such as fish and shrimp. For example, in Peicheng County, the price is low, sometimes even three or three and a half cents cheaper than in Shanfu County in Zhongyuan Province."

Uncle Zhang spoke enthusiastically to his nephew about the market situation around Fengyi County, "The supply of beef, mutton, and pork is huge, and there are too many small-scale farmers to cater to. But this area, bordering three provinces, is a major producer of aquatic products, with fewer small-scale farmers and a large consumer base. So, if I combine the wholesale prices from several places and set a public price at the new farmers' market in Fengyi County, then some wholesalers wouldn't need to bring their goods to the farmers' market; they could just sell them to any village..."

"Rolling, rolling, rolling..."

Originally, Coach Zhang was wondering what good thing it was, but when he heard about Uncle Zhang's wildly imaginative idea, it gave him a headache.

"Why? I haven't finished speaking yet."

"Uncle, do you know what you're doing? You're running a small-scale agricultural futures market. Be careful you don't get shot."

"what?"

Uncle Zhang was taken aback, thinking to himself, "I don't have anything shameful about me."

Is it wrong for me to provide convenience to the public?
"Take it easy. If it's just a spontaneous movement by merchants and individual business owners, and it serves a positive guiding role, that's fine. If you do things your way, then the common people and business owners alike will all follow your lead. Is Fengyi County under the Zhang family's control?"

"..."

Uncle Zhang, who doesn't know much about politics, has become more cautious now. Has he really reached a stage where he has to walk on thin ice?

Uncle Zhang thought he was going to learn how to figure out the "important intentions," but after sleeping for one night, he forgot about it the next day. He went to the government office in charge, paid a visit, and asked: "My Fengyi County wants to set up an agricultural futures market at the junction of three provinces. I don't know what procedures we need to go through."
go out!

The officials in charge felt that "Fengyi County" was there to cause trouble. If it weren't for the older sister and the young woman who received him thinking that "Fengyi County" was quite handsome, they would have kicked him out immediately.

But you know what, Uncle Zhang's blunt question about whether there was any chance...

It really does.

The call was made to Fengyi County, and after communicating with Director Jia, Director Jia led a team to conduct an on-site inspection of the Chengbei Agricultural Wholesale Market.

It would have been better if he hadn't looked. After reading it, Director Jia wondered why this Fengyi County North Agricultural Wholesale Market was never mentioned in Pengcheng City's commendation notices.
(End of this chapter)