On November 8, 1694, the small steamer filled with members of the North Korean mission set sail again, leaving Hening Port, and heading towards Mingfu Port, which is further upstream of the Bian River.

When their ship left, several small steamer loaded with immigrants were entering the port. These were merchant ships of the inland river transport company, rented by the State Development Administration to transport immigration and supplies to the Hening Port area. The above just confirmed that several new settlements were set up in the hinterland of Hening Port, namely: Guanping Township (near the town of Casilda in later generations), Jinsui Township (near the town of Firmat in later generations), Wulu Township (near the town of Marcos Juarez in later generations), and Qingping Township (near the town of Las Rosas in later generations), a total of four towns. It is expected that the first batch of immigrants will be resettled to engage in agricultural and animal husbandry production, so as to lay a solid foundation as soon as possible and provide support for the future development of the Hening Port industrial production base.

Agriculture is the basis of all production and operation activities. Food is the most important thing for the people. Only by solving the problem of eating can local immigrants settle down, reproduce and form the way a city should look like. Even in a country like the East Coast, which seems to be a deep industrialization, agriculture is still the basis of all social activities.

After a day of sailing against the river, the small steamer full of North Korean missions arrived at Mingfu Port, an important town on the right bank of the Bian River in the morning the next day. The city has a large population, with about tens of thousands of people (the county's population is close to 30,000). On the left bank of the Bian River, it is really the largest city except Shanghai.

Mingfu County is located at the intersection of east and west and north and south, and has a very superior geographical location, so the county's industries are relatively complicated. But if you look closely, the textile industry is actually more powerful. This is not only because the Ministry of Textile Industry has invested in the construction of a brand new textile industrial park here, but also related to the large cotton planting area planned on the Chako Plain in the north.

The climate of the Chako Plain and Rizhao are very suitable for cotton planting, growing and picking, so they are designated by the Ministry of Agriculture as the main cotton producing area on the east coast. After local cotton is harvested and roughly processed, they are basically transported to the bank of the Bian River through various means, and then shipped to the downstream Mingfu Port area for sale.

Mingfu Port now has the only cotton road and freight trading center in the country, and will surely become the largest cotton distribution center in the future. Therefore, the conditions for developing the cotton textile industry here are actually very prominent. There are several companies that have settled in the Mingfu Textile Industrial Park, the largest of which is the famous state-owned enterprise Dayuhe Textile Factory. This factory has a joint venture wool textile factory in the Nanmai area, but the factory's headquarters is still in Dongfang County, and its main production capacity is also concentrated there, using cotton imported from the Caribbean Sea and New China Island for processing. However, after careful consideration and approval from the Ministry of Textile Industry, Dayuhe Textile Factory decided to gradually move out of Dongfang County and set up the factory headquarters to Mingfu Port on the bank of the Bian River to use the resources of the Chako Plain nearby for production.

There is no doubt that the poor Dongfang County government will lose another source of wealth, and at the same time, the local area will also lose a large number of jobs. Well, maybe Dongfang County has become numb. In recent years, too many enterprises have been lost, such as the Dayuhe Naval Shipyard (moved to Shanghai), the Dayuhe Textile Factory (moved to Mingfu), the Dayuhe Arsenal (moved to Xincao), etc. This city is declining at a speed visible to the naked eye. It may be the only city in the country whose population is slowly decreasing. But no matter what, things are happening, and the local government and people should slowly deepen their understanding. Their hometown does not have much advantage in both the environment and location, and they are destined to be unable to retain these high-quality enterprises. In fact, it is not the most tragic time in Dongfang County. Imagine, what kind of scene will the local area be after all departments of the capital move away to Luoyang Prefecture?

Park Se-tang and his group carefully visited the new factory of Dayuhe Textile Factory, which was debugging machinery and equipment, and was amazed by this. The huge modern textile enterprises are naturally not comparable to those of North Korean workshops. Their efficiency in producing cotton is many times higher than that of North Koreans, which simply blinded their eyes. Moreover, the cotton fabric produced by the East Coast people seems to be far softer, whiter, and more styles than the native cloth produced by North Koreans. I believe that if it were not for the distance and the time cost of textiles in North Korea, the East Coast people would not calculate the time cost of textiles when they were idle, the East Coast cotton fabric would have completely captured the North Korean textile market. In fact, there are quite a lot of Ningbo cloths entering North Korea through ports such as Busan and Wonsan. Fortunately, the production cost of North Korean farmers is really low enough that their market has not been occupied on a large scale. But how long can their persistence last?

"This is a cotton-plowing machine that uses waste fabrics. It can effectively reduce production costs and waste... This is the latest automatic wool feeder, which can reduce manual use and reduce costs... The hair feeder is a new type of strip rubbing machine. Its appearance has replaced the old roving machine and greatly improved efficiency... This is a rotary cover carding machine. Its existence allows a large amount of short fibers to be used, which has a huge effect on the entire industry... This is a cap spindle machine and a ring spindle machine, which replaces the previous low-speed wing spinning machine..." As the staff introduced one by one, the mouths of Park Shitang and others grew bigger and bigger. They never thought that people on the East Coast could turn spinning and weaving into an art, with smooth and fast production rhythm, high efficiency to the production efficiency of cold storage, and the low production cost of making full use of all resources. Every one seems to be mocking the textile handicraft industry in the traditional farming society.

Park Shitang estimated that most of the textile machines of Tianzuguo have not been introduced to Ningbo yet. Otherwise, Dinghai Textile Factory would do its best to produce a large amount of cotton cloth with an outrageous price, with North Korea's current import tariff level (specified by the East Coast people), how much market share will the local cotton cloth lose? It's unimaginable!

However, after looking at these new textile machines, Park Shitang and others also became aware of the other party's intentions. They looked at each other several times and understood what the other party meant, that is, to find a way to purchase some textile equipment from Tianmaguo and bring it back, even if it is a low-tech country, it doesn't matter to develop North Korea's own machine and textile industry. There is no need to have too many textile machines, just one set, and buy some vulnerable parts, and basically they will live together. The only thing that is worrying is probably that North Korea's own cotton production is not large, and it has to find a way to solve the source of cotton raw materials. Maybe it's better to find a way in mainland China.

In addition to textile equipment, they also want to purchase some sewing and cutting fabric machines to develop North Korea's own wardrobe processing industry. They had stayed in Shanghai for a few days before and saw many privately invested wardrobe factories in the area. Those factories could use a large machine to cut fabrics according to the prescribed size, and then workers used sewing machines to make clothes. The efficiency was very good. There were many people in North Korea and the wages were cheap. If the development of the textile industry in the future, then changing the course, importing fabrics from Ningbo, and then processing and producing wardrobe by themselves is also a way.

In fact, there are already some signs now. After inspecting North Korea's wage level, some merchants in Ningbo have tried to set up several clothing factories in coastal port cities around Jeolladao, which specifically provides various clothing for the East Coast Navy. They have snatched a lot of business from Ningbo and have no choice but to build factories in North Korea. The cost of building factories is low and workers' wages are low. The government is not afraid to ask them for tax collection (many times it is symbolic, and the situation of tax evasion in enterprises is extremely common). Workers do not even have to pay for work-related injuries and deaths, which is very attractive to private bosses.

Park Se-tang is quite familiar with these situations. The two classes of ministers in the court asked about peace. The owners of the factory in Huanghai were never ruthless to collect money, but they ignored the clothing factories of Ningbo merchants in Jeolla Douan County. The taxes they each year depended on the other party's voluntary payment, which was simply two worlds. However, he didn't care. The clothing factory was opened there, and the workers they hired were still local, and the market was booming, which was quite beneficial to Jeolla Do. If the Ningbo bosses were unwilling to do this one day in the future, they could happily take the plate over and do it themselves. How great!

After visiting the new factory area of ​​Dayuhe Textile Factory, they went to the cotton trading center, which was also near the dock, and saw many cotton traders sitting behind the table whispering. The staff of the trading center ran to a huge blackboard from time to time, wrote down the price of the latest cotton transaction with chalk, and then caused a greater exchange sound.

Park Se-tang and others saw such a novel scene for the first time, but they didn't understand what it meant, they just felt it was novel. They didn't have enough financial knowledge, so even when the staff accompanying the visit told them that this involved the pricing power of cotton, he still nodded in a daze and said nothing. North Korea is too backward, and there is no need to be fancy like Tianzuguo and make some hard money, otherwise Tianzuguo would be unhappy!

On November 12, after staying at Mingfu Port for a few days, the Pu Shitang delegation and his group changed into carriages and began to travel west along the road under construction, with the destination of Luoyang Prefecture, the new capital of the east coast. According to the plan, they will stay in Luoyang Prefecture for a few days, and then take advantage of the warm weather to go west to the Andes and enter the coastal areas of Chile. They will stay in the Spanish harbor city of Concepción, waiting for the ship they were on to bypass Cape Horn to drive here, and pick them up from the Pacific Ocean to return to North Korea, of course, they will follow a East Coast merchant fleet, otherwise with the North Korean sailing technology, they will not be able to find the way back.
Chapter completed!