Productivity 2

Translator: Cinder Translations

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"So, my lord, how can we change this situation to make the distribution of food more balanced?" 

Cecil aptly raised the question.

Paul looked at him with satisfaction. What a suitable straight man, he thought, and then continued to speak with ease, "To solve the conflict where landlords are overfed and everyone else starves, we need to ensure that others have something—something valuable that can be used to exchange food from the landlords."

"For example, porcelain, pottery, ironware, paper, clothing, machinery, alcohol, and so on. And the industries that produce these goods are what we call manufacturing. If you add the extraction of raw materials for these products, that's industry. The more manufactured goods we produce, the more food we can exchange, and the more we can address the imbalance in food distribution."

Chief steward Ford shook his head. "I think it can only alleviate the problem. Those landlords who hoard food don't really need that many manufactured goods. The amount of food they are willing to exchange will always be limited."

Paul waved his hand, "That's why we need to expand the channels for sourcing food. If the local landlords are unwilling to release surplus food for exchange, then we will trade with landlords from other areas in the Northwest Bay, with other regions in the Kingdom of Aldor, and even with landlords from abroad."

Everyone understood the Earl's intention. In this way, as the urgency of local demand decreases, the relative value of the food hoarded by the local landlords would drop, or even depreciate, forcing them to participate in exchanges—if they don't want to see their wealth shrink any further.

"This is the purpose behind your proposal to establish a customs union?" The female advisor, Lady Setia, suddenly realized.

Paul nodded. "Yes, that's one of the important reasons. By lowering tariffs, we can make it easier for our manufactured goods to be exported, and also for external food supplies to enter, thus facilitating the exchange process I just mentioned—I call it a 'market economy.'"

Market economy? Yet another new term from the Earl.

Guy Burns, the head of the Alden Town Machinery Factory, sat in the corner, deep in thought. He usually only focused on technical matters and didn't know much about other things. He had been puzzled recently by why so many people resisted the Earl's customs union initiative. Now he understood: the landlords' pie was being threatened. Once manufactured goods and food started circulating, the landlords would no longer be able to exploit others at will. These people were truly despicable.

Paul's next words made everything clearer to him, "In the history of humanity, due to underdeveloped productivity, the amount of food produced and the goods made to exchange for food were always limited. And food is one of humanity's most basic needs. People can live without alcohol, pottery, or even clothes, but they absolutely cannot live without food. Those who control food and its means of production—such as land—always hold the upper hand. If a place is relatively closed off and productivity is low, essential items like food can easily create a seller's market, where the seller has the advantage. But if we improve manufacturing capacity and open up trade, we can substantially change the seller's market in our region. As for places beyond Alden, Byerldine, and Emden, we can't control them for the time being."

"However, my lord..." Paul's chief secretary, Bernard, thought further ahead: "Even if you can produce many valuable goods through the vigorous development of industry, and the landlords are willing to trade, as long as the overall food production is sufficient to feed everyone, population growth will still continue. If no one starves, the population will keep increasing, but the amount of food will remain the same, eventually leading back to a situation where demand exceeds supply, and people will still starve in the end."

The chief secretary's statement was already quite close to the concept of the "Malthusian Trap."

Paul explained: "As I just mentioned, productivity includes agricultural productivity. When our industry develops to a certain level, it can 'give back' to agriculture."

At this point, he glanced at Guy Burns. "The agricultural machinery such as reapers and seed drills produced by the Alden Town Agricultural Machinery Factory are examples. With these machines, more land can be cultivated and more food can be harvested with the same amount of labor. We can even research planting techniques to increase yield per unit of land to meet the needs of a growing population."

Guy Burns proudly puffed out his chest. He had always believed that his work was significant, and now the Earl had publicly affirmed its importance.

"And these agricultural machines, such as reapers and seed drills, were only invented and mass-produced thanks to the development of the manufacturing industry. As long as technology keeps advancing, it can alleviate or even solve the problem Bernard mentioned. As for what the world will look like once technological development reaches its peak, I dare say none of us here can foresee it, haha."

Through Paul's efforts over the past two years, the mining, ironworking, food processing, cotton textile, salt production, ceramics, papermaking, mechanical manufacturing, and cold weapon industries in Alden and Byerldine had made noticeable progress.

Due to the secrecy of technology, the production of porcelain, canned goods, and paper was unique in the world, and the production of other industries had also gained advantages thanks to technological innovations—such as the use of small blast furnaces, flying shuttle looms, spinning jennies, and the salt evaporation method.

The rise of manufacturing had created a large group of people who made a living from it. Although they still made up a small percentage of the total population, they had grown into a significant force in terms of numbers.

The original manufacturing model in the Northwest Bay was mainly based on family workshops, but under Paul's deliberate guidance in recent years, organized, large-scale workshops had begun to emerge like mushrooms after a rain.

Under the Earl's repeated orders, the government strictly prohibited workshop owners from buying slaves, so these workshops mainly obtained labor by hiring workers.

This approach maintained a certain degree of personal freedom while providing wages to support families. Working in workshops had become a new trend in the Earl's three territories, especially for the rural population. Some small farmers, who were struggling to survive due to poor harvests or oppression by large landlords, sold their land and moved to towns to make a living, which, in turn, promoted both the concentration of farmland and the growth of town populations—benefiting both agricultural and industrial development.

Paul had received sporadic reports that even some serfs were risking their lives to escape to towns to change their fate.

"So, everyone, under the current circumstances, where else can we break through in terms of productivity? Does anyone have any good ideas?"

Faced with challenges, Paul thought it would be better to gather collective wisdom and listen to the opinions of the natives of this world.

(The author admits to a shallow understanding of productivity and economic activities. If there are any errors in this chapter, please don't laugh.)

(End of the chapter)

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