Chapter 1084 Urgent Food Needs
Does food work?
Of course it is useful. China's thousands of years of history have never completely shaken off the shadow of food shortage. That is to say, since modern times, with the explosion of science and technology, the emergence of various new planting techniques has led to a surge in food production, and the total number of Chinese talents can eat enough.
Fenghuo is a magically changed historical world, but the importance of food has not diminished in the slightest.
Without relatively convenient transportation channels and strong regulatory measures, the price of food in Fenghuo often experienced regional skyrocketing or plummeting, which was very unstable.
When Shang Ji first entered the game, a stone of grain in Liaodong was only about 300 yuan (the average price of grain in Jizhou during the same period was less than 200 yuan), but later when Xianbei invaded, the price of grain in Liaodong skyrocketed to six silver a stone , a full twenty-fold increase!
After Xianbei was expelled, food prices fell sharply, and finally stabilized at five hundred silver a stone. After the Yellow Turban Uprising broke out, when the price of grain in Liaodong was the highest, it directly soared to eight silver a stone, which was 16 times higher than the normal price.
It wasn't until Shang Ji ruled Pingzhou that he made great efforts to stabilize prices, and the food prices in the ruling area were relatively stable.
Later, with the large-scale expansion of commercial enterprises, food prices also fluctuated, but because of the strong regulation, the changes in food prices were not too big, and at most they fell or rose by two or three times.
Because the foundation is too weak, even with the help of peasant children, the two prefectures of Pingchen have not yet achieved self-sufficiency in food (mainly because Chenzhou and the Grassland Dufu are dragging down, Pingzhou headquarters has achieved self-sufficiency, and even has surplus ). According to Deng Yan's statistics, in order to initially guarantee that there will be no famine in the two prefectures of Pingchen, at least 12 billion shi of grain is needed a year.
Seeing this, do you feel that crazy water conservancy construction is unnecessary?
Under Shang Ji’s rule, the grain output is now about 11 billion, and the demand is 12 billion, which is a difference of 1 billion. Do you think that the gap can be made up for by a little land reclamation and land expansion, and it’s not worth the trouble? To engage in basic water conservancy construction.
The above thinking is dead wrong!
12 billion stones are just the basic consumption, and even if the grain output is doubled, Shang Ji still feels that it is not enough!
Although Fenghuo has magic and internal power, it still obeys biological laws in some respects. For example, when the energy is transferred from the primary consumer to the secondary consumer, the transfer ratio is 10:1; for example, the consumption of individual life is closely related to the absorption.
There are nearly 1.2 billion people under the rule of Shang Ji. If they are all the most ordinary civilians, 12 billion shi of food is enough. But the reality is that besides civilians, there are also a large number of troops, rangers, and Taoists here!
The food that the ninth-rank soldiers and ordinary civilians need to eat is obviously not the same concept.
For soldiers of the ninth rank, in order to maintain their combat effectiveness, the amount of energy they need to consume every day is an astronomical figure. There are two solutions, one is to supplement the quality with quantity, eat a lot of ordinary food every day, and the other is to supplement the quantity with quality and eat high-grade food.
The former is time-consuming and labor-intensive, and the soldiers don't like it, which seriously affects the morale and combat effectiveness of the army, and is generally only used in emergencies. The more common solution is the second, which is to eat high-grade food instead.
What is advanced food? Spiritual grains, flesh and blood of ferocious beasts, medicinal food, etc.
Spiritual Valley is the most common, and the most widely planted area in Baicao Garden is Spiritual Valley. However, there is no need to repeat the output of Linggu. With the double support of Baicao Garden and farm disciples, the current annual output of Linggu is only a mere 120,000 shi, which can only be said to be a drop in the bucket.
The cost of medicated diet is too high, and there is no possibility of promotion at all, just pass it directly.
At present, the supply method of the high-level troops in the Shangji Army is the combination of Lingmi, Zhumi, Pill, and beasts, which barely solves the problem of food for the high-level troops, but life is still very tight.
And because the scale of the high-level army is getting bigger and bigger, and the output of Lingmi has not been able to have a breakthrough increase, the proportion of beasts and flesh in the army ration is getting higher and higher.
However, fierce beasts are not sheep on the grassland, they can eat whatever they want.
Hunting ferocious beasts is a very dangerous activity, and only experienced hunters dare to try it.
More importantly, the number of ferocious beasts is rare, their whereabouts are uncertain, and their supply is very unstable, which is a fatal threat to the army.
In order to solve this problem, some people proposed to domesticate ferocious beasts like cattle and sheep a long time ago, and provide a steady stream of high-grade flesh and blood through artificial breeding.
Facts have proved that this method is feasible.
With the efforts of high-level trainers, it has been proved that it is completely feasible to domesticate ferocious beasts. Artificially domesticated ferocious beasts can still provide high-grade flesh and blood. Although the quality is a little bit worse, it does not affect the use effect at all.
The only problem is the cost!
As long as they can be called fierce beasts, none of them are vegetarians (vegetarians are generally spirit beasts, with normal intelligence, and will not eat them except under special circumstances, and most of these spirit beasts eat spirit plants. ).
For the time being, domesticating ferocious beasts does not increase the fixed cost of advanced trainers and farms. The food fed every day alone is an astronomical amount. Fierce beasts must eat meat, and their appetites are quite picky. The selected beef and mutton are suitable for their taste.
Moreover, ferocious beasts generally have an astonishingly large appetite, and their growth rate is quite slow. A ferocious beast needs to consume hundreds of times the same volume of cattle and sheep to grow from a cub to an edible adult!
If you want to raise ferocious beasts, you must have a large amount of cattle and sheep as a base, and large-scale breeding of cattle and sheep can't be done only by relying on the natural environment of the grassland. You must have artificial animal feed, which is ultimately food.
Some high-level ferocious beasts even feed on low-level ferocious beasts, and the gap between them is even more exaggerated.
If it is converted into ordinary food, every beast is a mobile granary!
From this point of view, let alone 20 billion shi of grain a year, even 40 billion or 80 billion are not enough.
In addition to the army, ordinary people are also eager to improve their lives, and often eat a piece of beef, mutton or even beast meat, which further indirectly increases the consumption of food.
In addition, in addition to direct consumption, grain has other functions, such as wine making.
Because Pingzhou has always been in short supply of food, the production of grain wine is strictly controlled in the area ruled by Shang Ji to reduce food consumption. However, for the environment in Pingzhou, wine is a very urgent consumable, and the demand among the people is very large. It is also a troublesome thing if there is no supply for a long time, and it is easy to weaken the hearts of the people.
In addition to their own needs, food is also a strategic weapon. When encountering a general food shortage, if you have enough food in your hands, you can do whatever you want. This is something businessmen have deeply experienced during the national war.
All in all, for any force, the more food, the better, no matter how much food there is, it will not worry about selling. Under Shang Ji's rule, the grain output has increased tenfold, and there is still room to digest it.