Just now, Dong Shuheng held an industrial meeting in Huai Ke's factory. The meeting was attended by several important heavy industry companies and relevant officials from the Ministry of Commerce.
The Ministry of Commerce has compiled statistics on China’s coal and iron production in the first half of the year.
Due to the large number of brick and tile factories and lime plants being built, coupled with the increase in steel companies, China's coal demand has increased sharply.
In addition, the Chinese government is promoting the use of briquettes in cities and grassland pastoral areas. The market demand for coal is even stronger.
After the Chinese government took over the administrative management of various places, it issued a series of mountain forest management bills, stipulating that people cannot cut down trees at will.
The original intention was to protect vegetation, and of course another intention was to promote the use of coal.
China is a big coal country. Before natural gas became popular, using briquettes for urban domestic fires was undoubtedly the most environmentally friendly way.
The method of making briquettes is very simple. Large briquette factories can use steam-driven machines to make briquettes very quickly.
Small local workshops without conditions can also use a small hand-pressed tool.
Some people even bought coal, crushed it, mixed it with mud, and balled it into pieces with their hands. After drying, they could also be used to burn coal stoves.
In the past, people living in cities had to buy firewood for burning. Rich people would buy charcoal. This was very harmful to vegetation.
When China promotes the use of briquettes, the first thing to grasp is that it cannot increase the living costs of people, especially people in cities.
For rural people, encouragement is adopted, because even if rural people cannot cut down forests, they can still use their own crop straws.
There is no way to ban them, and many rural people are self-sufficient, so they cannot be forced to buy fuel, even if it is very cheap.
No system can be taken for granted. Otherwise, good things may turn into bad things.
When it comes to promoting briquettes, the Chinese government has conducted extensive field investigations and finally proved its feasibility.
Of course, it is mainly aimed at urban residents, because the cost of purchasing firewood for urban residents is usually higher than that of briquettes.
With the update of coal mining technology, the cost of coal mining has been greatly reduced, and it has become feasible to replace firewood in urban life.
The first thing that has changed is the environment in the city. Just using briquettes for cooking at home causes very little air pollution, at least less than burning firewood.
When there is demand, there is a market, which will then stimulate the development of the industry. For a time, a large number of briquette workshops appeared everywhere.
In many places, the government has established coal supply stations to provide a stable supply of coal.
People found that buying briquettes was not more expensive than buying firewood. Besides, it would also take time to go out of the city to find firewood.
Nowadays, China is full of waste and there are a lot of projects under construction in various places. It is still easy for ordinary people to find jobs.
So everyone’s time is money, and there are very few people wandering around on the streets. If you have time to collect firewood, you might as well go to work and earn more money.
Moreover, the business of making briquettes alone can create hundreds of thousands of jobs.
It can also spawn tens of thousands of small briquette making workshops.
"President, in the first half of the year, we opened more than 500 new coal mines, mainly in Shandong, Shanxi, Henan, Xuzhou and Jiangxi. Sixty-five percent of the coal mines used new mining tracks and steam.
Pumps produced a total of 12 million tons of coal in the first half of the year," an official from the Heavy Industry Department of the Ministry of Industry reported.
This number is much higher than that of the Manchu and Qing Dynasties, but there is still a big gap between Dong Shuheng's expectations.
You know, the British now produce 40 to 50 million tons of coal throughout the year, and their homeland is not as good as a province in China.
With China's population and size, its coal production must be at least ten times that of the British.
"Director Zhou, you should focus on studying the next demand forecast. I think there is still a big vacancy in coal production capacity, so the amount of coal mining will continue to increase."
"Yes, President, with the promotion of the policy of restricting the burning of firewood in cities and towns, and the establishment and expansion of coal kilns, lime kilns and smelting plants in various places, the demand for coal will increase. It is expected that in the second half of next year our coal production will exceed
Fifty million tons.”
"The Ministry of Commerce is planning to establish two large-scale state-owned coal mining enterprises this year, one in Yizhou Prefecture, Shandong Province, and one in Shanxi Province, to alleviate the current coal shortage."
"In addition, we are also actively guiding various places to develop some small coal mines. To this end, nearly 20 prospecting teams have been sent to various provinces."
"We will ensure that each province has its own main coal mine production area and can provide coal for domestic use nearby. Coal for bulk industry must also have a stable and convenient supply," said an official from the Ministry of Commerce.
Dong Shuheng has personally dealt with this issue, so everyone at the Ministry of Commerce attaches great importance to it.
"We can take bigger steps in this area. In the next ten years, we will not have overcapacity. Coal will be the main driving force for our domestic economic development in a short period of time." Dong Shuheng said.
There is also a lot of coal produced outside the customs, but like many places, after it is mined, it cannot be transported out and cannot be digested locally, so large-scale mining is not possible for the time being.
Coal mines in the Western Regions and the Far East are only mined on a small scale and are used as coal for local people's daily life.
At present, only the Heilongjiang area outside the customs has a relatively high mining value because it has excellent shipping transportation.
There, close to the water transportation channel, several large-scale coal bases are being planned. The coal here will be mainly supplied to the southeastern coastal areas in the future.
In the Western Region, what Dong Shuheng values most is not the coal resources, but the several shallow oil fields there that are easy to exploit.
There are very few oil fields in China that are easy to exploit. In the Western Region, Dong Shuheng plans to exploit and smelt oil nearby.
In ten years, China will take the lead in phasing out steam engines in the industrial field and seize the opportunity of the second industrial revolution.
Coal will be mainly used in the field of power generation in the future. The era of having a chimney in every factory will not last long in China.
Dong Shuheng did not want China to be like the UK at this time, where pollution was so serious that ordinary people walking on the street might faint from the polluted air.
Next, officials from the Ministry of Commerce continued to introduce steel production: "President, fellow managers, our pig iron production in the first half of the year was 1.5 million tons, and crude steel production was 500,000 tons. The imported steel was 750,000 tons, mainly
They are imported from Britain, France, the United States, Prussia and other countries. The steel gap is still huge. And as construction progresses in various places, this gap will get bigger and bigger."
The import of steel has always accounted for an important proportion of China's imported goods in the past two years.
The import of precious metals such as steel and copper has always been an important commodity for Dong Shuheng to balance the trade balance.
Why have Britain and France adopted this co-optation and appeasement policy towards China in recent years?
One of the important reasons is that Dong Shuheng lowered China's trade surplus.
Even after restricting the opium trade, China still spent the money it earned back.
What was exchanged for? Steel, copper, various machines, and even gold.
Gold will be China's currency reserve in the future, and it can only be entered but not taken out.
With the development of electricity and the invention of smokeless gunpowder, copper's strategic position has become increasingly high.
It is not only used to issue small denomination currency. Cables and bullets both require copper. Copper's ductility and conductivity, as well as its price, determine that it is the most suitable cable material.
China's copper reserves have always been seriously insufficient.
Gold is the future of the country's monetary reserves. From the beginning of the Huai Haijun period, reserves have been secretly carried out.
China already has the ability to manufacture various industrial machinery, but its production capacity is far from insufficient. Therefore, China still needs to continue to import from abroad.
Just like what Zheng Huigong said to Dong Shuheng in Xuzhou, if you want to buy a pneumatic hammer for blacksmithing now, you have to queue up at a big factory.
In addition, liberalizing the import of machinery can also promote domestic factories to cultivate a sense of competition, improve production processes, and reduce production costs to increase competitiveness with foreign products.
When the British and French looked at the trade figures, they thought this was okay. At least people were willing to buy things now. Unlike the Manchu and Qing government, which didn't buy anything, it was just a dime.
In fact, Dong Shuheng has been quietly accumulating strength. He can prepare China to be self-sufficient at any time.
China is about to have five large-scale steel plants, namely in Xuzhou, Jiangning, Luanzhou, Datong and Panzhihua, Sichuan. No one sitting here has heard of the fifth place, Panzhihua. It is a newly established county.
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Panzhihua, Sichuan, was just a small village a year ago.
At the beginning of the year, a prospecting team was sent there. The order for this expedition was issued directly from the Presidential Palace.
No one explained why the prospecting team was sent to such a small village at the junction of Sichuan and Yunnan.
No one knew this place before, it was just a small village by the Jinsha River. The name sounds nice, but it is actually just because this flower is abundant in the area.
But the prospecting team easily discovered a big surprise there - there was a large amount of vanadium-titanium magnetite that was easy to mine.
Vanadium titanium magnetite is not only an important source of iron, but also contains various components such as vanadium, titanium, chromium, cobalt, nickel, platinum group and scandium, which have high comprehensive utilization value.
Titanium, chromium, and nickel are all important components for making alloy steel. Moreover, the quality of the iron ore here in Panzhihua is very good.
This is a very suitable place to establish a special steel smelting enterprise complex.
The only bad thing is that local transportation is inconvenient. Panzhihua is close to the Jinsha River and currently can only rely on river transportation.
However, Panzhihua's river transportation is not very efficient because of the rapid water flow of the Jinsha River.
But now China has inland river steamships, which makes river transportation in Panzhihua possible.
In addition, high explosives can be used to blow up the reefs in the upper reaches of the Yangtze River, and it is now possible to reach the lower reaches of the Yangtze River directly from the Jinsha River.
The reason why Dong Shuheng wanted to build Panzhihua was not just because of the high ore content and good quality here.
The more important reason is that there is a lack of heavy industry in the southwest region. He must focus on the entire China to make the industries between various regions more balanced.
The opening of the Jinsha River river channel not only promoted economic development in the upper reaches of the Yangtze River, but also strengthened China's control over the southwest region.
Currently, of the five large steel plants, only those in Luanzhou, Xuzhou and Jiangning have been put into operation. The other two are still under construction.
In addition, there are many small steel plants in China, such as the steel plants built in the Taihang Mountains, and private iron plants in various places that existed during the Manchu and Qing Dynasties. The Foshan Iron Plant in Guangdong is relatively concentrated.
For these private ironworks, the Chinese government has been supporting them in industrial upgrading and changing the original indigenous smelting methods into more advanced steelmaking methods.
Foshan even built seven or eight new steel-making plants at once. All of them were time-honored iron plants.
After visiting those large steel plants, they all realized that they had to transform, otherwise they would be eliminated.
They are all businessmen. None of these people are stubborn and conservative. They can feel the benefits of industrial upgrading.
The government even provided low-interest loans so that they could purchase equipment.
In order to increase steel production, China has racked its brains.
"All the steel plant bosses are here today. Let's talk about increasing steel production capacity." Dong Shuheng looked at everyone sitting here.
"I am here to make a statement. In the next year, the government will fully support the development of the steel industry, not only in terms of funds, but also in terms of mineral buyout rights."
"We don't necessarily have to set up big factories. There are many places where we can start by setting up small factories. Accumulate experience and accumulate talents."
"Then we will slowly expand. Now I have completely opened up the domestic market, and all of your steel plants can participate in the layout." Dong Shuheng said.
It is foreseeable that China's steel demand will increase in the future.
Not to mention anything else, the steel for the naval ships to be built next will require hundreds of thousands of tons.
Coupled with the tens of thousands of kilometers of railways that will be built next, these will require a lot of steel.
In addition, local construction of houses, bridges and other projects, and machinery in factories all require steel.
In this era, if a country wants to truly develop, it really cannot do without coal and steel.
In terms of light industry, China is developing very fast. Because of the development of the domestic textile industry, there is basically no market for foreign cloth in China.
Not only that, the markets of the vassal states surrounding China were basically occupied by Chinese merchants.
If it weren't for China's vigorous import of steel machinery, countries such as Britain and France would have been impatient.
There is no way, the vassal states surrounding China are the traditional sales places for Chinese products.
Furthermore, China now also adopts machine production, which greatly reduces the cost, and the transportation cost is also lower.
Therefore, Chinese products are still very competitive in East Asia.
The food industry in China started very high and developed very rapidly. Various canned products are not only marketed in China, but also deeply loved by sailors from all over the world.
Various exquisite condiments and sauces produced in China are sold in European and West Asian markets.
Under the leadership of Huaihai Company, China's light industry has created many commercial blank areas.
The British sell cloth as long as they sell it, but merchants here in China will make cloth into ready-made clothes and sell them locally based on the characteristics of local people's clothing.
Because of the large scale of production, the cost of ready-made clothes produced in factories is cheaper than those in tailor shops, so they are very popular among locals, especially those in urban areas.
Ready-made clothes made of silk with exquisite embroidery became luxury goods in Europe.
China also produces precious furs and leather bags, and various products emerge in endlessly.
Even shoes and socks are finished products produced here in China. These light industries themselves are labor-intensive and can consume a lot of labor.
Dong Shuheng has been actively promoting the development of these industries and will also launch some new industries through Yangtze River Group and Yunmei Group.
Many factories were established following Feng Yunmei and Yangtze River.
Ordinary businessmen like to follow the trend. Yunmei opened a sock knitting factory today, which is very profitable. Many people will soon follow suit to join this industry.
These goods filled the gap in trade and had no external competitiveness. They quickly occupied a large number of overseas markets.
Even some European businessmen have imitated Chinese businessmen. However, this has actually promoted people's acceptance of China's diversified commodity development model.
As soon as Dong Shuheng said his words, the eyes of several steel company CEOs around him lit up. Not only the CEOs of the five major companies, but also other small business owners.
Today there are also representatives from some small private steel plants and coal mine owners here.
They all heard what Dong Shuheng meant. As a large state-owned enterprise, now is an important opportunity to complete its business layout.
As some small industrial and mining enterprises, now is their opportunity to become bigger and stronger.
The industrial base that Dong Shuheng originally laid out in Jiangsu seemed too small compared to the entire China now.
This is a great era, a great era of explosive development of Chinese business.
Those who are good at seizing opportunities will take advantage of this great era to soar into the sky. Others will always lag behind others.
ps: In the blink of an eye, half of October has passed. The days of writing articles go by very quickly. I feel that I am either writing or revising the article. I even go to work every day and don’t know what I do! It seems that everything is in my mind.
Coding. Okay! I am just a humble coder. You readers are the master! Gentlemen, please give me a vote!