Chapter 316: Not even a little bit off

When Zhou Yang and Kong Daming heard this, their eyes lit up immediately.

Yes.

They hadn't thought about it in this way before.

Cultivating land is the most difficult job, but if you have a farming machine, you can save a lot of effort.

This agricultural machine just drives back and forth like this, and the field is quickly tamped. If you hire one, wouldn't it be easy to cultivate 20 acres of land? !
An acre of high-quality farmland can be sold for five taels of silver, and an acre of inferior farmland can be sold for two taels of silver.

As long as the large tree stumps and rocks on the wasteland are cleared in advance, the plow can plow the field in no time.

In the first three years, the newly reclaimed land does not need to pay land taxes to the government. If people don’t want to plant the land anymore after one or two years, they can sell it.

Of course, for most farmers, land is their life. Once they have reclaimed the land, they will cultivate it themselves and very few of them will sell it.

After figuring out the cost, Zhou Yang and Kong Daming no longer thought the plowing machines working in the distance were expensive.

When the two returned to the village and told the villagers about it, at first they all said it was expensive.

"Village chief, although we have some money, two hundred coins per mu of land is too expensive."

Who would spend two hundred coins to open up a field? Anyway, they are reluctant to do so.

Zhou Yang was not surprised at all.

He smiled and said, "Listen carefully and I'll do the math for you and you'll understand."

"It takes at least six or seven days to cultivate one mu of land, and that's when there are four or five people working in the family."

"If you go to town to find work, you can only make 16 or 17 cents a day during the slack season. Five people can earn less than 100 cents a day."

"After six or seven days, I can earn about 600 coins. With a farming machine, I can cultivate at least 15 or 16 mu of land a day."

"With the time you save, you can find work and earn back the money you spent on hiring farm machinery, right?"

After this explanation, everyone present looked at each other in bewilderment and began to count on their fingers.

Kong Daming was also telling the villagers about this matter.

"You can figure out for yourself whether it's more cost-effective to cultivate the land yourself or hire a farming machine."

"Right now, there are only two large villages nearby, ours and Shangcun, and many suitable fields are unowned."

"If you don't take more when no one is around, you'll have to pay to buy it later if someone else takes it away."

Kong Daming said in a voice that could be heard by many people, "There are only seven laborers in my family, but there are many people who rely on us for food, drink, and defecation."

"My son and nephew are grown up, and they can't marry without sharing the land. My daughter and niece must bring a few acres of land as a dowry when they get married."

Kong Daming smiled helplessly and said, "We have to save some money for our family."

For farmers, their family property is the land.

In fact, after Kong Daming calculated the cost of using agricultural machinery and reclaiming the land by oneself, many people were already tempted.

When I heard that using agricultural machinery could reclaim more land, I felt it was a profit no matter how I calculated it.

"Village chief, my family wants to hire one."

"Village Chief, you are right."

"The people of Taohua Village have seen the world. If they all use it, it must be a good thing."

"Yes, my family will definitely hire someone anyway, and I also want to save some land for my descendants."

If you have land, you can sell it if things don't work out, and you won't starve to death even if things don't work out.

Many people silently calculated in their hearts that since Taohua Village had provided this year's grain seeds, their families only needed to pay for the use of agricultural machinery. One mu of land was 200 wen, five mu of land was one tael of silver, and ten mu of land was two taels of silver.

Twenty mu of land only costs four taels of silver, while one mu of medium-sized land costs three taels of silver, or three or four hundred coins.

So, hiring a farming machine is a great bargain.

Yang Xianglian has been going out early and coming back late recently, but she also found out about this when she came back in the evening.

"That must be hiring a farming machine."

She works in a cloth shop and knows all too well the difference between using machines and manual labor. The difference is not small.

"Mom and Dad, we really don't have much labor in our family. If we cultivate the land ourselves, I'm afraid we won't be able to cultivate three acres of land this year, let alone catch up with the planting time."

"If we pay three or five taels of silver, we can have more than ten acres of land this year. This is a sure win."

Mrs. Zhang nodded: "Yes, I heard the village chief say that today, and I thought so too."

On the side, Old Man Zhang counted on his fingers and said, "I calculated that, excluding the things we had to do at the beginning, such as digging tree roots and picking up stones, it is equivalent to spending 200 coins to buy one mu of land. It is really cost-effective."

"Dad, Mom, the cloth shop has a lot of orders right now, and I really can't get away. Let's hire a few people to clean up the tree roots and rocks in our house."

Then Yang Xianglian said earnestly: "We can't delay the time for planting crops."

Mrs. Zhang and Old Man Zhang looked at each other and nodded, "Okay."

Hiring people costs money, but overall it is much more cost-effective than buying land.

There is no other way. There is not much labor at home. If I want to get a few more acres of land without delaying the planting season of seedlings, I have to hire people.

Mrs. Zhang sighed, "It was a bit troublesome to open up the land for the first time, but it will be fine next year or the year after next."

Yang Xianglian also smiled: "Yes."

She was afraid that her parents-in-law would not agree, but unexpectedly, they were quite open-minded.

"Then our family is planning to get ten and a half acres of land first?"

Mrs. Zhang thought for a moment and said, "Let's round it up to twenty acres. Your father and I will just spend more time watching over the people working."

In the past, who would dare to say this? To reclaim one more acre of land, the whole family would have to work for several days, and it was common to lose a few pounds due to exhaustion.

That is to say, now we can hire people and use agricultural machinery to help, saving time and effort, so we can say that it is easy.

Yang Xianglian naturally would not object. After she responded, she took out the money and said, "Mom and Dad, I will go to the village chief's house soon. I guess it's not just our family that needs to hire people."

Mrs. Zhang: "In the afternoon, many people in the village said they wanted to hire someone."

After all, there are often more than ten or twenty acres of land, and it would take several days just to pick up stones and dig tree roots. How can you do it without hiring people?

There are several types of agricultural machinery, and land reclamation is divided into paddy fields, dry fields, mountainous areas and sloping land. The cost of one mu of land ranges from two hundred to six hundred coins.

While people were still plowing the fields bit by bit elsewhere, Bai Dacheng led a few people who knew how to drive agricultural machinery to the upper and lower villages respectively.

Several vehicles started together, and amid the roar of machines, in less than a week, every household in the two villages had more than ten or twenty acres of land.

Family members with large numbers like Kong Daming opened up more than 40 acres of land in one go.

Although everyone felt bad when giving the money at first, they immediately grinned with joy when they saw acres of their own land being reclaimed in a few minutes.

"It's so easy." Someone muttered happily. So many fields could be reclaimed in just one day.

Someone immediately responded: "It just costs money." His family spent five taels of silver.

Good night, see you tomorrow~~