On July 22, 1694, in an office of the Heishui Management Committee of Heishui County, there was smoke and the atmosphere was solemn.

A very important meeting is being held here. The leaders of the Blackwater Management Committee are all participants, including the Director of the Blackwater Management Committee, the Commander of the Whale Sea Squadron of the Third Fleet of the Navy (formerly the Okhotsk Sea Squadron), General Manager of the East Coast Japan Company, Hei Water County Magistrate, Deputy Commander of the Military Police Command, Commissioner of the Sakhalin Regional Administration, and Commissioner of the Hokkaido Regional Administration, and are exactly the seven members of the Blackwater Management Committee.

In addition, the director of Heishui Steel Plant, the director of Heishui Shipyard, the director of Heishui Gun (assembly) Plant, the general manager of Heishui Fishery Company, the director of Heishui Machinery Plant, the general manager of East Coast Japan Company, the director of Dabo Botanical Garden, the dean of Heishui Transportation College, etc. They are basically real power figures in Heishui area.

To be honest, it is not easy to be together. Because of the special traffic conditions in the Hei Water Management Committee, these top leaders who are scattered everywhere on weekdays have to get together, so they can only wait for the port to thaw in mid-to-late May and the flowers are blooming. Therefore, the annual work meeting of the cadres of the whole management committee is almost scheduled to be held in late July, when the climate is most suitable for the year.

The regional cadre work conference in 1694 has been held for three days. The next year's fiscal budget, cadre appointment and removal, and agricultural, forestry, animal husbandry and fishery production were discussed in the first three days. The agenda was relatively simple and basically passed in advance, so it was approved one after another.

Today (July 22) morning, the next stage of foreign policy was discussed. Although there were occasional arguments during this period, it was generally peaceful. In the end, everyone reached an agreement and the issue was passed smoothly. However, after lunch, the atmosphere suddenly became serious. The reason was that the discussion on capacity transfer proposed by Bai Yutang, director of the Management Committee, was fiercely questioned by the members of the congregation, and the scene was very awkward for a moment.

Bai Yutang had actually communicated with the two local committee members, Heishui County Magistrate and the Sakhalin Regional Administrative Office Commissioner. He proposed that Denglai and Ningshao repeatedly proposed to build heavy industrial facilities including steel plants to help them develop rapidly. For this reason, they were even willing to provide financial subsidies, and it didn't matter that the factory was fully controlled by Heishui District.

Bai Yutang believes that the Heishui area is now suffering from serious talent loss. Many professional workers have been poached by the southern Denglai and Ningshao areas, which has led to the decline in the quality of products produced by many factories in the region and the extended delivery time, which has caused a lot of trouble. Moreover, the two major ports in Heishui, Dabo, were frozen from the end of October, and the time lasted for more than five months, seriously affecting foreign trade. In winter, due to shortage of stocks in Denglai and Ningshao and other places, they had to purchase locally urgently, and lost many customers in vain.

In the long run, local basic industries will develop without developing, and will gradually become stronger with the time of retreat, destroying the heavy industry that Heishui region was once proud of, causing large-scale bankruptcy of the local economy. Instead of waiting for death, it is better to take the initiative to attack and take the initiative to set up factories in Denglai, Ningshao and other places while still having many advantages. Most of the equity is in your own hands to avoid the decline of large backbone enterprises, including Heishui Steel Plant and Heishui Shipyard.

As expected, Bai Yutang's move aroused doubts from other members of the Management Committee. The top leaders of several major state-owned enterprises attending the meeting also discussed it, and there were many dissatisfactions in their words. Bai Yutang was also helpless about this. He had communicated with some members and factory directors in advance, but did not obtain their support - this was predictable - but he still wanted to make another last effort to convince everyone to accept his proposal, but now it seems that the effect is obviously not good.

"Director Bai, these factories are the lifeblood of our Hei Shui. If we transfer them out, what will our Hei Shui people eat? Yes, when setting up factories in Denglai and Ningshao, the profits can be guaranteed, and there may be more than before, but what about employment? Unfortunately, they all disappeared! Our companies cannot just talk about profits, but also social responsibility. Sorry, I don't agree with this de-industrialization behavior. Local companies have the responsibility to provide local jobs with reasonable salaries, which is the basis for the people of Hei Shui to continue to maintain their current living standards." The Commissioner of the Sakhalin Regional Administration originally did not want to offend Bai Yutang, but the matter involved the life and death of local industries. He had to stand up and speak, otherwise he might be scolded by many people in the future.

"There is no need to worry too much about the decline of Heishui enterprises. Indeed, in recent years, a large number of outstanding workers left their jobs and went south. They either tempted by high salaries, yearning for warm climate, or other reasons, eventually leading to certain problems in the production of enterprises. But this is by no means the reason why we give up producing products locally." At this time, the county magistrate of Heishui had to bite the bullet and object, and he continued to say: "Take the Heishui Steel Plant I am familiar with as an example, I can bear it.

It is said that Denglai and Ningshao areas lack corresponding technologies, and it is impossible to establish mature large steel production enterprises in the short term. I have been to Denglai once before and heard that they set up a small furnace for iron smelting in Weihai County, but the technology is very backward, and the iron produced is very problematic and has not been effectively improved so far. Because, I think the situation of Heishui Steel Plant is very good, so don't worry for the time being. Heishui Machinery Plant may be a little troublesome. The machinery processing industry in Denglai and other places has risen rapidly in recent years, mainly Nanzhigong

The company invested, there is no way to do this. But Director Bai, the number of employees of Hei Shui Machinery Factory is related to hundreds of families. Once the company leaves, what should they do if their livelihoods are done? I really can't imagine it. I think the Management Committee and the Regional Administration should increase the allocation to the factory because they are in a fiercely competitive industry. They must increase research and development efforts and launch flagship products with their own core technologies. Otherwise, they will always produce some big road goods, and they will collapse sooner or later. As for the Hei Shui Shipyard and Hei Shui Gun Factory, Denglai

Ningshao currently has only some ship and weapon repair institutions, and the limitations are quite large, so we still have considerable advantages. I dare not say what will happen in the future, maybe they will be surpassed, and then our factory is penniless and turns into a pile of broken copper and iron. Maybe we can persist and continue to suppress their related industries. From a financial perspective, buying these shipyards and other things now and then undergoing technical transformation may be the best choice, but this will lose a lot of jobs. Please think twice. "

The speeches of the Sakhalin Regional Administrative Office Commissioner and the Heishui County Magistrate made Bai Yutang feel a little irritated. He considered it from a long-term perspective. The weather in Heishui is cold and the living environment is not very friendly. It is normal for employees with ability to yearn for warmer places, which will inevitably weaken the production level of local enterprises. In addition, the cost of keeping the factory warm and anti-freezing should be considered. It is also a big trouble for port freezing in several months in winter. These are fatal to delays in business opportunities, and in the long run, it will have a very negative impact on the company.

Finally, there is another very important point, that is, the population in the jurisdiction of the Hei Water Management Committee is relatively small, so the chance of producing talents is naturally not as good as in the South. In the long-term industrial competition, this is a very huge disadvantage, which is enough to slowly smooth out all the current technical advantages of the Hei Water Factory.

Based on these factors, Bai Yutang is very pessimistic about the future of Hei Water Industry. He cannot sit idly by and watch these large high-quality enterprises slowly decline and finally depreciate and have nothing. Therefore, it is better to take advantage of the advantages of technology and production to gradually transfer production capacity to the warm southern region. Anyway, the local government has agreed that the enterprises are still controlled by them and most of the profits belong to them, which greatly protects the interests of Hei Water. After all, compared with the so-called taxes, the profits created by enterprises are the big part.

However, this capacity transfer or de-industrialization can certainly protect the benefits of enterprise owners (i.e., the Hei Shui Government) and even take them to a higher level, but it is not so friendly to local workers. They will undoubtedly slowly lose their jobs and then be unable to maintain their existing living standards, which will eventually lead to the destruction and decline of the entire region's economy, which many local cadres cannot accept.

Look at the factory managers and managers who attended the meeting. Many of them are from the East Coast. They don’t even know where Hei Shui is before coming, let alone their feelings for this land. But after living for a long time and having a wife and having children, their butts involuntarily turned here and began to seriously think about the future of the Hei Shui area.

Similar to them, many local cadres in Denglai and Ningshao were all from local corps and fortresses. They strictly followed the will of the central government and carried out their work meticulously. They were the most powerful weapon for local control of these vassal states. However, after a long time, they were still inevitably localized. When thinking about problems, they no longer took local interests as the first priority, but began to consider local and their own interests more. This is human nature and there is no way out, so Bai Yutang's move attracted many opposition, which is a very normal thing. Is it true that local protectionism has a market at all times?

At this time of the meeting, it was actually a bit frozen. The Hei Shui County Magistrate and the Sakhalin Regional Administration Commissioner directly objected, and the General Manager of the East Coast Japan Company and the Hokkaido Regional Administration Commissioner were ambiguous, but the Deputy Commander of the Gendarmerie in charge of the Far East clearly expressed his opposition, because the technology had the risk of spreading to the Qing and Shun Kingdoms. In the end, the Navy also expressed its opposition, because the reason was the same as the gendarmerie, who was worried about the spread of technology, and the Army and the Navy had surprisingly consistent opinions on this matter.

At this point, there was basically no suspense, and the issue of transferring industrial capacity was rejected. While Bai Yutang felt that his authority was challenged, he also became fully vigilant against these local interest groups. This situation must be more than the local cadres of Heishui, Denglai and Ningshao, and the local will also have their own ideas. Over time, local will will be formed. The native white nobles of the Spanish American colonies were able to resist Madrid's orders. Do officials in the overseas colonies of the East Coast have no interest in their own interests? Perhaps in a few decades, they will become increasingly dissatisfied with the restrictions and shackles from the local area, and demand that the local area loosen more policies to them. This is almost inevitable.
Chapter completed!