Chapter 52 Adding Money
Antalaha, Madagascar.

"Mr. White, the number of workers your company has transported to Antalaha has far exceeded our original agreement. You should give me an explanation and stop your cross-border behavior. Otherwise, I will have no choice but to terminate our cooperation and report to the governor." Antalaha's mayor Ed said angrily.

After Little John left Madagascar, the person responsible for contacting the colonists on the island was replaced by White, who came here with Little John and his companions.

White previously worked as a sales manager at Shennong Bio-Pharmaceutical Company. Zhang Feng thought he had good eloquence, so he arranged for him to take over the position. The income was three times that of working in the United States, so he gladly accepted it.

"Mr. Mayor, our company is doing very well and developing very fast, so we naturally need more workers. Don't worry, we will not threaten France's colonial rule. After all, we are just a commercial company, aren't we? Making profits is the company's responsibility."

White first comforted him, then threatened: "And don't forget, Mr. Ed, our company has paid you on time, and it has increased a lot in recent months. Otherwise, how could you have such a luxurious life now? If the Governor knew about this, it would be bad for everyone. It's good for everyone if we continue to cooperate."

In fact, this is not the first time that Ed has gone to White to complain about the crime of the American China Company not executing the agreement, but every time White would prevaricate with various reasons and then use his money power to shut him up.

However, as the number of Chinese people brought by the American-Chinese Company's immigration ships increased, Ed could not help but feel more and more fearful. He worried that they would be like many previous colonial companies, first renting a piece of land, then continuing to immigrate, and finally becoming colonists.

If the China-America Company was sent by America to compete with France for Madagascar, then he would become a sinner of France, and he would have to be afraid.

"Even so, your Meihua Company doesn't need so many people. If you continue like this, even if I don't report it, the Governor will find out sooner or later. Then we will all be finished, and it will cause disputes between the two countries." Ed argued.

"Mr. Mayor, this place is very remote and far from the capital Antananarivo. The Governor will not find out. We are just doing normal business. The two countries will handle this peacefully. We don't have to worry about it. You can take the money and continue to enjoy your luxurious life. In the future, the Meihua Company will increase your compensation."

White continued to comfort them, saying that he knew it was only a matter of time before the Governor found out, but his superiors told him not to worry about these things, as they would take care of them. He only needed to ask Mayor Ed and Captain Sean to continue their cooperation with the Meihua Company.

At this point, Ed had no choice but to accept it. Although he was worried about the consequences of the incident, he was reluctant to give up his current life of drunkenness and debauchery, and he didn't have the courage to report the matter to the Governor.

But even so, he will still solve this matter in his own way.

In fact, the Meihua Company has already moved its registered address and now does not belong to any country. It is just continuing to fly the American flag and pretend to be something it is not.

The new registered address is Zhangjiacheng, Madagascar. On the surface, the person in charge of the company does not seem to have any relationship with Zhang Feng. At most, he only has a cooperative relationship with Zhang Feng's company.

In this way, if anything happens in the future, it will only be the personal behavior of Meihua Company and will have nothing to do with any other person or country. It will not be subject to the jurisdiction of other countries, and will not affect Zhang Feng, at least on the surface.

In order to reduce the risk of being discovered, only a small number of the immigration ships of the Meihua Company docked at the port of Antalaha, and most of them were cargo ships transporting various goods. The immigration ships basically docked at the coast near Zhangjiacheng. The Meihua Company bribed the coastal patrol soldiers under Sean to build a simple floating bridge on the deserted coast and transported immigrants like smuggling.

Today, after more than a year of immigration, five towns have been initially established in and around Zhangjiacheng, with a population of up to 5. With continuous investment in agriculture, although food self-sufficiency has not yet been achieved, that day is not far away.

This is also because Zhang Feng has issued a new order to speed up the pace of immigration. Otherwise, according to the previous immigration speed, the Meihua Company planned to achieve food self-sufficiency by the autumn harvest this year.

Zhang Feng asked the Meihua Company to change its current plan and focus on agriculture and heavy industry, with light industry only needing to meet the most basic living requirements of the immigrants.

Take clothes as an example. The Meihua Company only has one garment factory that produces a unified style of clothing so that immigrants have clothes to wear. Don’t even think about other higher pursuits and enjoyment.

The senior executives and white engineers of Chinese American companies had to spend a lot of money to ship the items they needed from America, such as beautiful skirts, stockings, red wine, watches, etc.

Try to invest limited human, material and financial resources into agriculture and military industrial enterprises to achieve food self-sufficiency and reduce the company's expenses on purchasing food from outside; rapidly develop its military industry so as to be able to take over the transfer of scientific talents.

The military industry mainly includes various firearms, cannons, engines, cars, tanks, airplanes, warships, aircraft carriers, etc. The scale can be small, but it cannot be non-existent.

Currently, it is built with difficulty using engineers and a small number of scientists collected from the United States and European countries during the Great Depression due to production pressure and the temptation of high salaries. The initial plan is to build all the experimental facilities for scientists to use in research and development before the partners send people over.

Then, on this basis, with the help of scientific and technological talents of our partners, we will expand and complete the whole project within ten years, developing a complete military industry. By that time, the supporting heavy industry will be basically completed, even though it is still far from complete as a whole.

But in the future, when compared with other first-class countries in this regard, although there is a big gap in scale, we can still maintain a balance in technology. In addition, we can also cultivate a large number of talents in the system of European scientific teachers studying scientific research and lay the foundation for cultivating talents, which is the most important thing.

As for light industry, Zhang Feng does not have the capital to develop it comprehensively now, so he can only make choices. After all, heavy industry is the foundation of a power.

As more immigrants come, restrictions will be relaxed to allow people with money and skills to enter the industry and make up for the shortfalls of Chinese companies in the United States.

As for whether it can be done, it depends on Zhang Feng's subsequent operations. In fact, this is not a problem. As long as it can increase the income of workers and reduce the gap between the rich and the poor, it is impossible for everyone to do business. Only a few bosses can make a lot of money. The majority are workers and farmers. We must ensure that they have sufficient consumption capacity in the future to achieve internal circulation.

(End of this chapter)