Chapter 247: 246 [Competition Between Machines and Manpower]

Originally, Zhou Hexuan planned to go up the river, take Zhang Leyi, and take a riverboat from Nanjing to Mount Lushan. But because of the human harvester, Zhou Hexuan had to return to Shanghai again and contacted Yu Qiaqing about business cooperation.

"This is your harvester?" Li Zongwu looked at the machine in front of him in surprise, which was only half the height of a person.

90% of the machine is made of wood, only the iron buckle on the threshing wheel and the inner axle are made of iron. The upper threshing wheel is connected to the pedal with two belts, and the person can drive the threshing wheel to rotate as long as the pedal is stepped on like a sewing machine.

Li Shuhua smiled and said, "Mr. Zongwu can try it himself."

Li Zongwu stepped on the pedal cautiously, and the threshing wheel on the top immediately whirled and turned, and he said cheerfully: "I want it, I want it, I just want it."

Li Shuhua explained next to him: "With this machine, when farmers are harvesting rice, one person can be responsible for cutting the rice, and the other is responsible for threshing. Just put the ears of rice on the threshing wheel, and the machine can make the rice quickly. Shedding, threshing cleaner than traditional methods. We have experimented, using this human harvester, two people is equivalent to the workload of six people before, the labor efficiency has increased by three times, and it is more relaxed and labor-saving. "

"Increase the efficiency by three times? It's great to use the grid," Li Zongwu said in surprise, "The small farmer's family has a machine like this, so it's much easier when the farming is busy."

Wheat is good, but rice harvesting is far from being as simple as increasing the efficiency several times.

After the rice is mature, there are only a few days for the best harvest. Harvesting too early is not mature enough, and rice grains tend to fall off automatically when it is too late, causing great waste. And it also depends on the weather. There are heavy rains in summer, and when rice is harvested in rainy days, incomplete drying will lead to mildew of the rice.

With this kind of human harvester, rice can be harvested in a short time, which not only saves manpower and material resources, but also avoids waste caused by weather factors, thereby increasing the rice harvest rate per unit area.

Li Zongwu said eagerly: "This kind of machine should be produced as soon as possible. I will help you contact Yang Sen and Liu Xiang to promote the harvester to Sichuan."

Yang Sen was the largest warlord in Sichuan last year, and was removed from military and political positions by the Nationalist government because he took in the defeated Wu Peifu.

Although the national government was unable to deal with the leaders of the Sichuan warlords, it had the righteousness of the central government. After Yang Sen was dismissed, his ambitious men were ready to move, Guo Rudong took the opportunity to stand on his own, Fan Shaozeng (Fan Shaer) switched to Liu Xiang, and his strength was greatly damaged, but Liu Xiang rose along with the trend.

With Li Zongwu's reputation in Sichuan, both Yang Sen and Liu Xiang value him a lot, and it is very easy to help promote human harvesters.

Zhou Hexuan said happily: "If the harvester can be promoted smoothly in Sichuan, that would be the best."

Li Shuhua expressed his thoughts: "It's too slow to find businessmen to cooperate and promote, and it is more appropriate to find the government."

Zhou Hexuan thought carefully, "Then let's find the Ministry of Agriculture and Mining for cooperation. The Minister of Agriculture and Mining, Yi Peiji, is also in Shanghai. There is no conflict with seeking cooperation with Yu Qiaqing."

At the beginning of the establishment of the national government, there was no Ministry of Agriculture and Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry. It was called the Ministry of Agriculture and Mining, and it was in charge of agriculture, forestry, fishery and animal husbandry.

The Minister of Agriculture and Mining at this time was Li Shizeng's in-law Yi Peiji. This gentleman not only serves as the Minister of Agriculture and Mining, but also serves as the president of the Labor University. He is in charge of the education work in Shanghai. Because the National Government has taken action on the education system, it will soon set up an education bureau in Shanghai. The first director happens to be with him. Zhou Hexuan has a personal grudge against Chen Dezheng.

After discussing the plan, everyone split up and acted immediately.

Li Zongwu didn't wait for Wu Zhihui to come back, so he resigned and ran back to Sichuan (Harmony) to help promote human harvesters. On the other hand, Zhou Hexuan and Li Shuhua went to Shanghai to discuss with Yi Peiji and Yu Qiaqing about government-business cooperation.

Zhang Leyi felt very helpless. This trip to the south was said to be to go to Lushan to propose a marriage, but there were too many things to do on the way, and the business had to be postponed again and again.

Two days later, Zhou Hexuan met Yi Peiji, Minister of Agriculture and Mining, in Shanghai.

He didn't hand over his business card or post a greeting, and asked someone to send Li Shizeng's calligraphy directly. In addition, both Li Shuhua and Yi Peiji belonged to the school of studying in France, so the atmosphere at the first meeting was very harmonious.

"Mr. Zhou, Runzhang, is this machine really as easy to use as you say?" Yi Peiji couldn't believe it.

Li Shuhua said confidently: "You might as well try it first."

Zhou Hexuan suggested: "We can find a mature rice field, and then invite many reporters and businessmen to witness it. Divide the rice field into two equal parts, one side is harvested by harvesters, and the other side is harvested by traditional methods. What do you think? ?”

"This method is good, intuitive and credible." Yi Peiji laughed. If he can successfully promote the harvester and benefit the farmers, it will be a great thing for him to improve his reputation and political achievements.

...

Today, traditional rice is widely planted in China, and its growth cycle is slightly longer than that of hybrid rice in later generations.

From the end of July to the beginning of August, the relatively early-maturing rice fields are already golden, while the late-maturing rice fields will wait until the middle and late August.

This morning, a team composed of officials from the Ministry of Agriculture and Mining, newspaper reporters, and representatives of the Shanghai business community marched mightily to the Jinshan area in the outer suburbs of Shanghai.

"Minister Yi, Mr. Yu, Mr. Zhou, Mr. Li, Reporter Liang..." Meng Huaiming, a local wealthy gentry, stepped forward to salute one by one.

Meng Huaiming is a big landowner in Jinshan, and this harvesting experiment was carried out in his rice field.

Local farmers came to see the surprise one after another, and reporters and businessmen were also very interested in it, waiting to see the results of the competition.

A golden rice field is divided into two parts. Four long-term workers use traditional harvesting methods, and the other two long-term workers use human harvesters.

Li Shuhua was the referee. He opened his pocket watch and shouted: "Get ready, start!"

At the beginning, because the long-term workers were not familiar with the machines, they were in a hurry and often ignored their hands. In a panic, even the rice stalks were stirred into the threshing wheel, causing the machine to be stuck.

The other four long-term workers used the traditional method of harvesting and threshing very neatly, and the harvesting speed was faster than the machine.

Li Shuhua's face was a little ugly, and he ordered the accompanying Peking University students to clean up the machine, while the farmers who watched the excitement talked a lot:

"What kind of broken machine is this? It will stop working after you fiddle with it."

"Haha, how can those gentlemen who drink ink know how to do farm work?"

"It's okay to weave cloth with a machine, but we farmers are better at harvesting rice."

"..."

Including those businessmen and reporters, they all thought that the machine was going to lose the game. Because after more than ten minutes, the amount of rice harvested by traditional methods is more than twice that of machines.

However, as time passed, everyone was dumbfounded.

After the two long-term workers became familiar with the machine, they gradually caught up and overtook them very easily.

Their opponents only completed two-thirds of the work until the machine finished harvesting...