Chapter 182
After hearing what Xia Juhua said, Captain Niu shook his head and said, "I'm really not trying to be brave. I've been taking care of the production team these years, and I don't think I've let you down. Even if I'm no longer the production team leader, no one will poke my spine. In the future, I don't want anyone to poke my spine either."
Xia Juhua felt that he had some hidden meaning in his words, so she asked, "Do you have any plans?"
Captain Niu nodded and said, "I do have some ideas. If you have nothing else to do, I'll talk to you about it and you can help me make a decision."
Xia Juhua naturally wanted to hear what he was going to do, so she followed Captain Niu to his home. The yard was made of ordinary adobe walls, and inside the yard was an adobe house that had been weathered by wind and rain. Xia Juhua couldn't help but say, "Ordinarily, you should build a brick house."
The two sons and one daughter all work in the factory, and the two daughters-in-law also work in the fields to earn work points. Their family income should be top-notch in the production team, and they are not a family that cannot afford to build a brick house.
Captain Niu looked at her and smiled: "You still live in an adobe house, why should I build a brick house so early? Don't you see that Li Daniu hasn't built one either? And Captain Li Da and his family all live in the old courtyard too."
Xia Juhua was slightly moved, and smiled at Captain Niu's wife who was pouring water for her: "I'm sorry to have made you and I suffer."
"It's not torture." Captain Niu's wife said quickly, "It just looks a little old, but it's not cold in the winter and doesn't leak in the summer, so it's pretty good. In the past, living in this house, I was worried about food, clothes, and money, which was torture. Now I can eat whatever I want, and I can buy whatever I want with money. I'm enjoying my life."
That's exactly what happened. Xia Juhua felt that Captain Niu had a high reputation in the third team, and his wife must have played a significant role. After pouring the water, his wife did not leave, but sat and talked with Xia Juhua.
The first to speak was Captain Niu. He told Xia Juhua that he saw that the Ping'anzhuang team had too much work to do and wanted to form his own team after the land was divided up - he didn't dare to think too far ahead, but if he could get half of the new houses that the Ping'anzhuang team wanted to build, it would be enough for him to work for a year or two.
"Establishing a house-building team is a good thing, but it won't work without enough people. Why don't you go and discuss it with the house-building team in Ping'an Village? It would be best if the two places work together." Xia Juhua felt that Captain Niu lacked experience and should be led by the team from Ping'an Village.
Captain Niu said somewhat embarrassingly: "They are all experienced in building houses. We are just starting out and we are afraid that we will be held back. It is obvious that we want to take advantage of them."
"Haven't you taken advantage of Ping'an Village enough in these years?"
Want to build a building in the city? Captain Niu thought he was very bold, but Xia Juhua was even more bold than him, so he couldn't help asking out loud.
Xia Juhua nodded at him and said, "What's wrong with building a building? Aren't the buildings in the city built by people? If you think you have no experience, I'll ask Xiao Qi to find two people to teach you how to read blueprints."
When thinking of reading blueprints, I have to say another thing: "When you are leading a construction team, you can't just look at who is stronger and who works harder. You also have to find two educated people who can do the math for you or help you read blueprints."
It takes time to learn to read drawings, and they are not needed at this stage, but Xia Juhua thinks that people should learn it now, so that when they need it in the future, they won't be unable to find it.
Captain Niu felt that Xia Juhua's joke was actually the truth - in recent years, the third team had been following Ping'an Village closely, and the members' lives were much better than those of the other three production teams, so they had indeed taken advantage of Ping'an Village.
As Xia Juhua said, they had been taking advantage of the situation for so long, so this time was no big deal. The only difference was that he had taken advantage of the situation with the entire production team before, but now it was just him. So Captain Niu and Xia Juhua returned to Ping'an Village and found that the streets were still quiet and not as panicked as Team 3. There were still people coming in and out of the production team yard, and none of the Team 3 members had angry or excited expressions on their faces. Almost everyone was smiling as before.
"Captain, hasn't Ping'an Village started to distribute the land yet?" Captain Niu felt that this was the only possibility.
Xia Juhua felt that there was nothing she couldn't say: "It's true that it hasn't been divided yet. Qiu Sheng said that everyone wants to do another collective autumn harvest. After the autumn harvest is over, the shares should be calculated and divided."
After taking a look at Xia Juhua, Captain Niu suppressed his thoughts. He had no choice but to suppress them. He was not Xia Juhua, and the members of Team 3 were not from Ping'an Village. They only cared about not getting any loss in the land and farm tools distribution.
"Captain, Captain Niu." Li Changman, who was in charge of the Ping'an Village building team, was called over by Xia Juhua. He greeted the two people and said nothing more, as if he was waiting for Xia Juhua's instructions.
Captain Niu was already accustomed to the fact that the people of the Ping'anzhuang production team only called Xia Juhua "captain" instead of "big captain". However, he still looked at Chen Qiu Sheng unconsciously and found that he was concentrating on counting the shares and didn't even glance in their direction.
But the matter must be discussed in front of Chen Qiusheng, because Xia Juhua hopes that Chen Qiusheng will be involved in anything related to the development of Ping An Village. And Chen Qiusheng never lets Xia Juhua down, and his ability to find loopholes and make up for deficiencies is extraordinary.
When he heard that Captain Niu also wanted to recruit a team to build houses after the land was divided, Changman Li rubbed his hands and said, "You can follow us. There are so many people who want to build houses that it's hard to keep up. Your people will be able to get started in a few days."
Xia Juhua looked at Chen Qiusheng, who was still counting his accounts, and asked, "Are they still going to hand over their profits to the team?"
Chen Qiusheng then raised his head, and the smile in Captain Niu's eyes was clearly calculated: "Of course it's better to pay some. The brigade can manage a lot of money, but there are even more people who want to ask the brigade for money. If our production team has some money, we don't have to rely on the brigade when encountering problems, and many things will be much easier to handle."
Xia Juhua also agreed with this, but asked worriedly: "But the brigade can be retained, but as for the production team, I'm afraid..." they can't stay.
Chen Qiusheng smiled and said, "The production team can't stay, but the people are still Pinganzhuang people. If not, we can change the name of the house-building team to the construction team, and run it like a weaving factory. Then the two factories will be combined to form the Pinganzhuang cooperative factory, and the profits will be handed over to everyone and divided into dividends as in the past, so the money will be settled."
It was easy for Xia Juhua to hear him say that. Her eyes widened. Chen Qiu Sheng was truly a talent. He had come up with the idea of an agricultural cooperative right now, something that had only emerged after the land transfer in the previous generation.
However, Xia Juhua did not think there was anything wrong with showing up early. At least in Ping'an Village, those who could not work in the three factories had another place to go, which could ensure that one person in each household could earn cash on a monthly basis.
Captain Niu looked at Chen Qiu Sheng with great admiration, and with just a few words, he made Xia Juhua agree that Ping An Village was an indivisible whole, and that it was a bit of a waste of Chen Qiu Sheng's talent to be just the director of a vermicelli factory.
"The cooperative factory also needs someone to manage it. Where else can we find such a person except you?"
Chen Qiusheng couldn't help but cough, reminding Xia Juhua that Captain Niu was still there. Captain Niu smiled indifferently: "I think what the captain said makes sense. If you don't become the factory director, Li Daniu doesn't have the brains, but Sun Qinglin does, can you trust him with that little plan?"
Chen Qiusheng was worried, but he had a better candidate: "If you want to manage the cooperative factory well, no one else can be the factory manager unless you are the team leader."
Why are you talking about me again? Xia Juhua was about to wave her hand, but Chen Qiu Sheng's words made her put her hand down again: "We set up a cooperative factory because we are going to expand the construction team soon, right? don't become the director of the weaving factory, Zhang Cuiping won't understand."
Xia Juhua felt that Chen Qiu Sheng was even more talented because he made such a confident statement about being afraid of his wife. Thinking about the two years before the production team was disbanded, the team had nothing to do except family planning. As the team leader, it was not suitable for her to follow Qi Weidong to trade in seafood, so Xia Juhua acquiesced.
Chen Qiusheng's smile deepened, and he continued to calculate his own account, allowing Li Changman to ask Captain Niu how many people he could bring to join the construction team. Coming to the production team to discuss it was just to let Chen Qiusheng hear if it was feasible. Now that even the cooperative factory had been decided, Li Changman took Captain Niu to his home to discuss it in detail.
After the two men left, Chen Qiusheng raised his head again and said to Xia Juhua, "If our production team were to set up a cooperative factory, we would only have a weaving factory and a construction team, which would be a little insufficient."
Xia Juhua had watched TV all her life and knew that big companies were not just one or two businesses, they were all about diversification and doing whatever made money quickly. Naturally, she agreed with Chen Qiusheng's words: "It's a small number, but we are from the countryside, there are not many jobs we can do." Even if they wanted to do it, the current knowledge level of Ping An Village people was not enough.
Chen Qiusheng smiled with a calculating look on his face: "Actually there is another job that we can do."
"The eggs produced by the chickens raised in Pingan Village are now in great demand. After we stopped selling to the Red Star Supply and Marketing Cooperative, the other two communes came to us and were willing to add a cent to the price of each egg and collect the eggs from the production team themselves. Now the Red Flag Supply and Marketing Cooperative comes to collect the eggs every five days and dares not deduct any money or give us IOUs."
Xia Juhua had known about this for a long time, and immediately understood what Chen Qiusheng was up to. However, she felt a little embarrassed: "Nowadays, every household has to work or farm. It's already quite strenuous for the elderly at home to raise 50 or 60 chickens. If they raise more, they will be exhausted."
Chen Qiusheng smiled even more happily: "Then let's build another chicken farm and set aside an area specifically for raising chickens. The experienced elderly people can gather together and send three or five young people to do the work of transporting feed and carrying things."
"If that's the case, we can raise more pigs. Talk to Lu Sheng and ask him to mark out another area next to the pigpen." People whose economy has just recovered care most about eating well and filling their stomachs after more than a decade of hunger. Xia Juhua feels that raising only chickens is not enough. Even if they raise twice as many pigs, they won't have to worry about not being able to sell them.
Hong Ling looked up and said, "If we really raise chickens together, it will be much easier to collect the chicken manure. It will also save people from being lazy and cleaning the chicken manure every few days, making the neighbors smell bad."
The chicken manure in Ping'an Village is a good thing. It is carefully collected and spread on the ground. After two or three years, even if wheat and sweet potatoes are planted in one year, the ground will still be black and oily, and whatever is planted will be productive.
This was also Xia Juhua's deliberate guidance. With her around, it was not difficult for Ping'an Village to buy more fertilizer than the quota, but she coordinated various materials but rarely coordinated fertilizers - in the past, in pursuit of high yields, everyone tried their best to spread fertilizers on the land, not only did the food taste bad, but the land was almost hardened.
Of course she has to learn lessons in this life. She may not be able to protect other places, but she can use less chemical fertilizers on Ping An Village's own land and eat more green food in the future. She can still make an effort.
So when Xia Juhua heard Hong Ling mention the benefits of building a chicken farm together, she nodded immediately: "Let's ask everyone later. If everyone is willing, we can go and fetch some bricks to build a chicken coop. This year we will just raise them together and the chickens will belong to whoever they are."
Chen Qiusheng shook his head and said, "This year's figures cannot be calculated that way. The money from selling chickens and eggs all goes to the chicken farm - it costs money to buy bricks, build chicken coops, and buy feed. The production team can make some money in the early stages, but they have to pay it back when the chickens are sold. We can't expect the weaving factory to keep them alive first."
Good ideas should of course be adopted. After Xia Juhua nodded, Chen Qiusheng continued to talk about his own ideas, which naturally hit Fifth Master: "It's too hard for Fifth Master to hatch chicks by himself, and not many chicks can be hatched at a time. I think we can set up another hatchery. After Fifth Master teaches the young people, he won't have to keep an eye on them every day. As long as we can ensure that the chicks hatched are as easy to raise as the ones Fifth Master hatches now, won't people from all over the country who want to raise chickens have to come to our Ping An Manor to buy them?"
What he said made so much sense that Xia Juhua had no room to object - if you want to run a chicken farm, you need a large number of chicks, and it is really unrealistic to rely on five chickens to incubate them one by one or for each chicken to have its own nest.
Then build another incubator!
Anyway, in Xia Juhua's memory, there was a machine called an electronic incubator. If she bought that thing, Fifth Master wouldn't have to stare at eggs every day at such an old age.
Hongcui listened to their enthusiastic discussion. Soon, the Pinganzhuang production team would have two more factories. She couldn't help but sigh, "If all of them are built, how many people will be needed? Will there be anyone left to farm in Pinganzhuang?"
"There are many machines for farming now. They can be turned on in the field, collected and packed in bags, and two people can carry them to the warehouse." Xia Juhua said casually.
Chen Qiusheng was waiting for her to say this: "But when the land is divided among households, a plot of land can be as large as three or four mu, or as small as one mu. There is no room for machines to turn around. You will have to listen to it every day. It is inevitable that someone will press down another person's land by one ridge, or someone will cut two more bunches of leeks from another person."
He seemed to be very contented as he stood up and stretched his back. "Anyway, the production team will be cancelled after the land is divided. I don't have to worry about these trivial matters. I just need to take care of the vermicelli factory."
Xia Juhua was shocked. The production team was cancelled, but the brigade was still retained, and she was still the brigade leader. It was very likely that she was the one who dealt with these matters every day!
Watching Xia Juhua leave, Hong Ling whispered to Chen Qiu Sheng, "Is it okay?"
Chen Qiu Sheng still smiled: "Whether it will work or not depends on whether the Fifth Master is very angry enough."
With the fifth master present, the whole family of Liu's family sat there waiting for Xia Juhua. They were not just waiting for nothing, they also had prospects and expectations for the future. When they saw Xia Juhua come in, Liu Xi, who was guarding the kitchen door, jumped out and greeted her loudly: "Sister-in-law, you are here? Why do you look unhappy? What happened?"
In Xia Juhua's eyes, Liu Xi had become much more stable since he became an electrician, and could be regarded as an adult. She said, "There is something I want to talk to Master Wu about."
She likes to nag Fifth Master whenever something happens. It's no secret in Ping An Manor. Liu Xi understands and leads her into the house, saying, "My family members are also unsure and are discussing this with my master."
As they were talking, everyone in the room had already greeted Xia Juhua. Liu Daxi asked anxiously, "Sister-in-law, can we divide the land among our families?"
This question was not an abrupt one: the news of land distribution had been circulating for a few days, and it was impossible not to think about which piece of land my family might get.
Xia Juhua looked at the people in the room and asked in confusion, "You all want to be grouped together?"
Liu Daxi nodded affirmatively: "I just want to be assigned to the same plot, even if the land is a little inferior, it will be easier to take care of - if the land is small, the machines can't turn, and most of my family members work in the factory, so if the machines are not used, the land will just be left uncultivated."
Xia Juhua was shocked. This possibility was too great. Only a small number of people in Ping'an Village did not work in the factories. The main workforce of each company was making cash. If the two factories she had just discussed with Chen Qiu Sheng were built, at least half of the remaining talent would be needed.
There is only a quarter of the labor force left, and they are not even able-bodied people. It is impossible to cultivate more than 500 acres of land without making full use of machines!
If you want to use a machine, the land is too small for the machine to be deployed. The time it takes to move the machine back and forth is also a problem. If you want to fully utilize the machine, the land area must be sufficient.
Seeing Xia Juhua in deep thought, Master Wu winked at Liu Daxi, and soon everyone in the room left except Liu Xi. Xia Juhua then told Chen Qiusheng about the two factories she had just discussed, and repeated her worries: "If everyone went to work in the factories, the money earned would definitely be enough to buy food for the family. But I feel bad that such old land is left uncultivated."
As a farmer, who wouldn't feel sad when seeing only weeds growing in the fields but no crops?
Master Wu took two puffs of his pipe and said, "You can start a factory by raising chickens and pigs, but you can't start a factory by farming?"
Xia Juhua felt her eyes light up. In her previous life, before she took the medicine, some places had already started land transfer, that is, transferring the land that people did not have the energy to cultivate to people who were interested in expanding and strengthening agriculture, and carrying out intensive, refined and characteristic management.
It seems to be working well.
"If I start a factory from farming, what will happen to the vegetables for everyone?" Xia Juhua was used to being self-sufficient, and she felt that the vegetables she bought were not as good as the ones she picked from her own plots of land.
The fifth master said nonchalantly, "If anyone wants to eat vegetables grown by themselves, they can still have their own private plots. We can give them some land in front of and behind their houses, and they can take care of it in ten or eight minutes after work. For the rest, we can also set up a factory, plant and harvest together, and use machines instead of many people."
Now the people who are still farming in Ping'an Village are led by Liu Sanzhuang. They know how to use the seed drill and combine harvester very well. There are more than 80 people in total who can plant the land very clearly. If they are allowed to plant again, there is no need to adjust the personnel.
Xia Juhua thought for a while and said, "Then let's discuss it with everyone." We had agreed to divide the land, but after two days they didn't. We had to let everyone know the reason.
Wu Ye smiled at Liu Xi, and Liu Xi jumped up and ran out: "Let me see if the water is boiling. Why hasn't it been boiling for such a long time?"
Xia Juhua looked at Liu Xi, who was running faster than a rabbit, with some surprise: "He wasn't watching in the kitchen, and he blamed it on the water not being boiled."
The fifth master smiled, not caring at all that Liu Xi had gone and would never come back, and discussed with Xia Juhua what to do if someone disagreed to build a factory while farming. The final result was that no matter who disagreed, they could not participate, and no one would have opinions about them. They would also give him the land he deserved without any loss, and divide the land well, so that all the land he deserved would be divided together.
It's not that we are afraid of people causing trouble, but we don't want to destroy the land.
None of the members of Ping'an Village wanted to take advantage of this. Everyone said that they did not have the energy to farm at home, so they just handed the land over to the farm to farm together. The land was handed over to the farm to farm, and each person received 500 kilograms of food each year. The remaining profits went to the cooperative factory, and together with the profits from the weaving factory, construction team, chicken farm, and hatchery, all members received dividends at the end of the year.
It was not until Chen Qiu Sheng announced in front of all Ping An Zhuang members that Xia Juhua was the director of the cooperative factory and held 10% of the shares alone that Xia Juhua realized that the shareholding that everyone had agreed on had been changed by him.
As soon as she stood up, Wuye and Zhao Xianzhi held her on both sides. Wuye straightened his hunched back and said to the members: "According to the policy of the higher authorities, our land will be divided among individuals. But if it is divided, how many of you think you can continue to take good care of the land?"
No one answered.
"The construction team and chicken farm that we are going to set up will need people to be selected from the members. Who will be selected? Do you feel safe with the people you trust? Do you believe that she will choose people based on who is suitable for the job, not because of who has a good relationship with her?"
"Xia Xiaohuo!"
"I, the old man at the hatchery, taught you how to do it. Whether I was willing to teach or not, I didn't teach you with all my heart. Who do you think can persuade me?"
"Xia Xiaohuo!"
Listening to everyone's neat answers, Xia Juhua's eyes were filled with tears. She looked at Zhao Xianzhi, An Baoling, Chen Qiusheng, and Zhang Cuiping. She wanted to tell everyone that these people had a good relationship with her.
Zhao Xianzhi seemed to know what she was thinking, and whispered in her ear: "Think about it yourself, besides your mother-in-law, who in Ping'an Village has a bad relationship with you?"
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