Chapter 692 The results of the Autumn Fair

Van Longen had never quite understood why Van der Wegen, who led six armed sailing ships to the battle, was beaten and abandoned by the Haihan people, but when he saw the Haihan fleet docked at the Victory Port military dock, he could feel it to some extent.

Van der Wegen was helpless at first. Yes, the armed forces under the Haihan people were not just merchant ships equipped with a few cannons, but a real combat fleet. Compared with them, the armed merchant ships of the East India Company were inferior in strength.

There is an obvious difference.

As for how much it will cost to maintain such a huge fleet, Fan Longgen, as the commander of a merchant fleet, has some idea. The most terrifying thing is that the Haihan people obviously have more than just such a fleet. They have ships in Fujian and Annan.

A large number of combat ships have also been deployed, which means that there are at least two other fleets. Van Longen believes that the warships seen here must be multiplied by at least three, or even a larger multiple, and that is the Haihan maritime combat strength.

the real situation.

The only good thing is that the company's board of directors did not make a rash decision to attack Sanya or start a full-scale war with Haihan. Otherwise, judging from the current situation, the East India Company would probably suffer heavy losses once a war started.

As an officer, Van der Wegen had already seen things with his eyes straight. After staying in Sanya for more than a month, he finally saw the goal of his trip. However, the Haihan people did not leave him more time to observe, so they just

I'm afraid it will be difficult to explain the intelligence information that can be collected from such a far distance to the big bosses on the board of directors after I return home.

In order to prevent the Dutch from making any more irrational actions, the Haihan Navy specially dispatched two "Exploration-class" sailing ships to "escort" the Dutch fleet all the way south, and did not turn back until the next day.

After seeing off the Dutch fleet, the Sanya Autumn Fair finally entered its climax. Businessmen from all over the world gathered in Sanya to sign various cooperation agreements. Among them, the larger projects were mainly concentrated in the Qiongbei area.

It is a collective farm project with an area of ​​more than 10,000 acres, and there are seven of them this time. In addition, agents from all over the country have signed contracts together. This time, in addition to Fuzhou and Guangzhou, there are also many merchants who come all the way from Hunan, Jiangxi,

Zhejiang and other places came here in order to obtain the "provincial sales agent qualification" for some Haihan products in Ming Dynasty.

As the sales channel network led by the Haihan Ministry of Commerce has been gradually rolled out in Fujian and Guangzhou provinces in the past two years, the sales area of ​​Haihan products has gradually extended to inland provinces and the central and northern areas of Ming Dynasty. Some people have good vision and connections.

The merchants are preparing to follow the example of their counterparts in Fuzhou and Guangzhou, take the initiative to establish business cooperation relationships with Haihan, and underwrite Haihan products in areas that Haihan's own business channels cannot reach.

Almost no one will have doubts about Haihan's strength after inspecting the actual situation on Hainan Island. Wherever they go, including local officials, they obey the Haihan people. This large island is located on the edge of the South China Sea of ​​the Ming Dynasty.

It seems to have the atmosphere of a country within a country. However, businessmen do not care so much whether what the Haihan people do here is not allowed by the national law. They only need to know how much profit they can make by cooperating with the Haihan people, and what the Haihan people have.

Sufficient ability to ensure the stability and security of this cooperative relationship is enough. As for whether the Haihan people are loyal to the court and the emperor, can these be turned into white money and put into their own pockets?

The Autumn Trade Fair ended successfully at the end of October. During this period, in addition to receiving a large number of product orders, two provincial-level business guilds, namely the Guanghai Commercial League and the Fuhai Commercial League, were also established. This kind of guild is similar to the previous Haihan Commercial Association.

The "Qiong Lianfa" organized by the organization was different. It was not a profit-making organization based on a joint-stock system, but a relatively loose business alliance spontaneously organized by merchants in the Ming Dynasty.

As the name suggests, the members of this kind of business alliance are all merchants who have business dealings with Haihan. It can be said that they are all stakeholders of Haihan, and the influence of these people after grouping together in the local area is also very considerable. Haihan wants to go abroad.

If you only rely on your own strength to promote the values, culture, finance, lifestyle, etc., the efficiency will certainly not be very high, but with the participation of these regional business alliances in the promotion, the effect will be very different.

Taking Guangdong and Guangxi as an example, the members of the Guanghai Business Alliance basically include all the state capitals such as Chaozhou, Huizhou, Nanxiong, Shaozhou, Guangzhou, Zhaoqing, Luodingzhou, Gaozhou, Lianzhou and Leizhou under the control of Guangdong. There will be

Establish a unified information channel. Once any new products or foreign policies come out in Haihan, they can be promoted to the entire province in a short period of time, without relying on word of mouth as in the past.

Let’s slowly expand the scope of influence.

The benefits for Ming merchants to participate in this business alliance are also obvious. In addition to being able to obtain the underwriting qualification of Haihan products at the first time, get the latest market quotations, etc., the most important thing is that with so many powerful merchants gathered together, it is easy to

It can intervene in the market and obtain more profits. Moreover, Haihan Bank will also provide more special services to the business alliance to facilitate the settlement of funds by members of the business alliance during the transaction process and improve the efficiency of its capital operation.

.

For Haihan, in addition to the various benefits that can be seen on the surface, this form also has the purpose of using the opportunity to suppress those local governments that are unwilling to cooperate with Haihan, or even adopt a hostile attitude towards Haihan.

Merchants. Moreover, with Haihan's strength, he can provide all kinds of help to the people he supports, especially military support that the local wealthy gentry are very interested in.

The Li family supported by Haihan in Guangzhou has almost become a model for all foreign cooperation. A few years ago, the Li family was besieged by bandits and almost wiped out. Now it is known as the number one village in Guangdong and Guangxi, not to mention the rich.

And it has extremely strong military equipment. Currently, Golden Shield Escort, which exists in the form of an escort agency in Guangdong and Guangxi, although it is an escort agency on the surface, people who know the inside story know that this escort agency is no different from a private army.

Not only is it highly organized, but all the weapons and equipment used are specially supplied by the Haihan people, and all the personnel are also trained by Haihan - many of the escort leaders have even served in the Haihan militia.

experience.

Governments in various places also turn a blind eye to the existence of Jindun. Firstly, the power of the Li family and the Haihan people behind Jindun is indeed powerful enough. Generally, grassroots officials of the sixth and seventh grades cannot influence them at all; secondly, occasionally local officials

There will also be places where Jindun can be turned to for help, such as escorting bankers, severely punishing criminals, capturing wanted criminals, capturing robbers and bandits, etc. Jindun is much better at these tasks than the local government officials, and they are all involved.

It's handled very cleanly and won't cause too much trouble to the government.

From the perspective of local wealthy people, armed organizations like the Golden Shield can do even more private work. They can look after homes and homes, and they can also maintain their appearance. If the dignitaries of the Li family are traveling now, it is all possible.

The escorts carrying Haihan muskets accompanied them, and the pomp was even greater than that of some officials. Who wouldn't be envious of it?

At this Autumn Trade Fair, Haihan conveniently announced that in future foreign cooperation, all members of the business alliance can apply for Haihan's military support, including personnel training, weapons purchase, rescue and disaster relief, etc. This will undoubtedly provide

This is an excellent opportunity for those local big business owners who have always been envious of the Guangzhou Li family and the shareholders of "Qiong Lianfa". They finally have the opportunity to sit on an equal footing with these pioneers and happily show off.

The special treatment given to business alliance members like this covers almost every aspect imaginable. Haihan Bank will set up a dedicated counter for the business alliance, and there will be exclusive warehouses for the business alliance at various docks, as long as it can reflect the differences in the status of the business alliance members.

are included in the relevant instructions of the business alliance in detail. Although the businessmen do not understand what VIP treatment is, nor do they know what differentiated services are, but these are just the benefits temporarily listed on paper.

It has made them feel the difference of being a member of the business alliance.

Of course, there are entry thresholds for enjoying these benefits. In addition to certain requirements on the asset size of members, members of the business alliance must also pay a certain amount of public fees every year. In the words of Schneider at the business alliance promotion meeting

He said that this kind of measure is to raise the entry threshold and not let the merchant association become a low-level guild where cats and dogs can sneak in. The tycoons not only do not feel disgusted by this, but they take it seriously. The purpose of entering this circle is to make friends with people of equal strength.

As a business partner, who would be willing to cooperate with someone whose level and concepts are too different?

Although Haihan will not directly lead or interfere in the daily operations of the business alliance, he still has great influence in it. The first chairman of the Guanghai Business League is Li Jifeng, the shopkeeper of "Fu Ruifeng", and the Fuhai Business League's

This position is held by Xu Xinsu's second brother Xu Xinzhe. Even if someone wants to cause trouble in the business alliance, it will be difficult to grab the real right to speak.

After finishing the affairs of the Autumn Fair, the Executive Committee started to implement the next step of the plan without stopping, which was to eliminate the Shibazhi and clean up the waterways along the coast of Fujian and the Taiwan Strait. Although the scale of the battle was not as good as the Annan Civil War, the combat distance was not as good as that of the Annan Civil War.

There are no islands in the world, but this combat goal can still be regarded as a new challenge for Haihan.

The defensive power of the Ambrosia Islands was very limited, and Haihan took it without much effort. After that, he occupied a geographical advantage and could easily defend against the Dutch counterattack. However, Shibazhi had occupied Penghu for several years.

Moreover, he still has a young and strong population of nearly 10,000, and his strength at sea cannot be underestimated. It is impossible to fight as easily as on Ambon Island. When fighting in Annan, the supply line was far away from Fujian.

, coupled with the obviously superior mobility at sea, the pressure of combat is much less. If the battle is in Fujian, food and grass can be raised locally in Fujian, but military supplies basically still have to be transported from Hainan Island. Once the war is over,

Okay, such a long supply distance will become the biggest operational obstacle.

In order to solve this trouble, the relevant departments have also prepared a solution. On the one hand, they are negotiating to get the Dutch to quit and no longer provide assistance to Shibazhi. On the other hand, they have also begun to prepare combat supplies and ship them by sea in advance.

Transport to Fujian. However, this kind of transport cannot be made public and must be carried out secretly to avoid alerting the enemy. Therefore, almost all the ships that perform this task are from Daming Maritime, and no ships of the Shipping Department are used.

On November 5, a Fuchuan fleet passed through the narrow channel outside Tielu Port and slowly sailed into Tielu Port. Tielu Port, located on the west side of Sanya and in the southeast corner of Hainan Island, is currently under the control of Haihan

The production capacity of the salt farm is second only to that of Yinggehai, and is much higher than the production capacity of the Shengli Port Salt Farm and the Danzhou Bay Salt Farm that have just been put into production. At the same time, it is also the most important sales point for Haihan's private salt sales.

Big salt dealers like Luo Shengdong now come to Tieliang Port for shipment.

However, the fleet arriving today is a little different. After arriving at the dock, it did not start loading immediately like other salt transport ships. Instead, it parked quietly on the shore and did not move. After other salt transport ships arrived,

They all want to finish loading in a few to five times and leave quickly so that they can make one or two more trips every month to earn more money. Why don't they have the leisure to stop here and waste time - Tieliang Port has a narrow channel and can only enter the harbor.

The number of docked ships is limited, so parking here requires hourly charges. Even Luo Shengdong would not let his ship dock here for more than half a day.

However, this fleet, which did not fly out its flag, has been silent. It is obviously planning to spend the night here. Several other ships carrying private salt hurriedly left before sunset, leaving only this fleet.

Standing alone on the pier on the west bank of the harbor.

After dusk fell, the dock suddenly became lively. Porters appeared pushing teams of carts, and torches and lanterns were lit up on the ship's side. The sailors quickly set up the gangplank, and then the porters began to move onto the ship.

Shipping boxes of goods.

These goods are all military supplies produced in Tiandu's workshop, secretly transported through the valley between Tiandu and Tielugang, and then shipped here in the name of private salt. In order to keep the secret as much as possible

, this kind of shipment is often arranged at night, and the sailors on the ship do not know what the contents of these goods are - they only know that the goods transported in this trip are much more valuable than private salt, and they can

The wages you receive will also increase significantly.

The shipment of goods was not completed until late at night. When the sky was just getting dark, the fleet silently left Tieliang Port and headed northeast. Their destination was Hong Kong Island at the Pearl River Estuary.

The goods still need to be loaded and unloaded there, and then the merchant ships from Fujian will complete the next step of transshipment and transport them to Kinmen Island in Fujian, where the Haihan Military Advisory Group is stationed.
Chapter completed!