Chapter 1335
Let the leaders of the autonomous region see our efficiency
Since Li Long had already told Li Yuhe, he didn't waste any more time. He said to Li Yuhe, "Boss, if you want to eat crabs for lunch, take some time to scrub them. I'll give you an old toothbrush to brush off the dirt on the crabs. Wear the stab-proof gloves from yesterday so you don't get pinched by the crabs."
Seeing that Li Long had brought up the topic of daily life, Li Yuhe changed the subject and asked with a smile, "So what are you doing?"
Li Long said, "I'll call Director Du in Kuitun right now and ask him to bring over the drip irrigation tape equipment and raw materials in the next couple of days."
Li Yuhe was somewhat surprised. He pointed to the factory building and said, "You haven't even installed the main gate yet. How are you going to set up the equipment here?"
Li Long smiled and said, "It's only when the main gate isn't properly secured that the equipment can be installed inside. Once the main gate is in place, installing the equipment inside becomes quite troublesome."
Li Yuhe was skeptical of Li Long's words, but he did not stop him.
He just needs to see the results. Anyway, coming for a checkup takes time, so he can treat these few days as a semi-vacation.
Li Long drove to his older brother's house. Li Jianguo hadn't gone out to work yet. Xie Yundong and the others were there. After Li Long got out of the car, he smiled and said, "It's good that you're all here. I have something to tell you."
Xie Yundong then asked, "Is the cooperative about to hold a meeting? Xu Haijun hasn't arrived yet."
Tao Daqiang immediately stood up and said, "I'll go call him!"
While Tao Daqiang was looking for Xu Haijun, Li Long called Director Du and asked him to bring the equipment over in the next couple of days.
Factory Director Du replied, "Sure, no problem. The equipment has already been prepared for you. Is your factory building finished? The equipment requires three-phase power to start up; have the power lines been installed?"
Li Long honestly replied, "Not yet, I plan to get the electricity connected today."
Factory Director Du said, "Okay, there's still time. I'll have it loaded onto the truck today, and the shipment will be ready by tomorrow. We've sold quite a lot of equipment these past few months, so the money for this set of equipment will be deducted from your profit share. We'll transfer the remaining money to your account when the six-month period ends in June."
After Li Long hung up the phone, his older brother Li Jianguo asked, "Is your factory building finished? Why do you need to bring the equipment over now? I heard it was just topped out."
Li Long explained, "The leaders from the autonomous region who came to inspect said that in order to pass the inspection, the factory must be able to start operations. It's also my fault for being a bit impatient at the time, and I directly said in the report that I had a factory. As a result, when they came and saw that there was only a factory building, it was definitely not enough."
Li Jianguo then asked him, "I heard you just mention electricity; you're going to bring electricity to the factory, right?"
Li Long nodded and said, "Yes, that equipment needs three-phase power to run. After we finish talking, I'll go find Lao Huang from our team and get the power connected."
As they were talking, a car horn sounded outside, and Li Long knew that Xu Haijun had arrived.
Stepping out of the house and seeing everyone in the yard, Li Long didn't waste any words and said, "I've gathered everyone here to discuss something important. Some time ago, I applied to the autonomous region for a support project, which is to transform our cooperative's land into drip irrigation fields."
Xu Haijun said, "This project is huge! Will the autonomous region approve it? I heard that drip irrigation can produce 300 to 400 kilograms per mu. If we can actually grow that stuff, we'll be rich!"
Xie Yundong shook his head and said, "Xiaolong said that drip irrigation for cotton yields high output, but the cost is also high. If we use the conventional planting method, we will not only not make money, but we will also lose money."
All eyes were on Li Long.
Li Long continued, "Here's the thing. The autonomous region's support project mainly involves canal renovation, construction of pump houses and filter beds, and laying of main pipelines."
What we need to do is connect drip irrigation tape. The cost will definitely be high, but I've decided to set up a drip irrigation tape manufacturing plant in our village, which will help reduce the cost.
In addition, we use water from the small pond for irrigation, which saves on water costs. This way, the overall cost is reduced, and as long as the yield reaches over 300 kilograms per mu, we can make a profit, and a considerable one at that.”
He explained what he had told Li Yuhe to everyone, and the people in the cooperative naturally agreed with it.
Li Long continued, "According to preliminary calculations, the autonomous region will allocate 30 yuan. Of course, it's not that the money will be allocated directly; it's that the project will be given to us to do directly."
However, the money might not be enough to build a canal from Xiaohaizi all the way to our cooperative's land. But don't worry, I'm planning to invest some money to repair the main canal and pave it with cement slabs, as a contribution to our team.
Upon hearing this, Tao Daqiang immediately objected: "Brother Long, how can you be the only one contributing money? It's not just the village that benefits, but also the cooperative. We all made money from the cooperative, so if we're going to contribute, we should all contribute our share."
Xie Yundong and Liang Dacheng nodded in agreement, and Jia Weidong also expressed his approval. Xu Haijun stroked his chin and said, "Actually, the team should contribute part of this money. This would benefit the whole team. The remaining land in our team is leased out every year, and the lease fees are quite substantial."
Li Long waved his hand and said, "Let's not cause trouble for the team. The team directly approved 20 mu of land for my drip irrigation tape factory. The team leader has been quite considerate of me. Let's not argue about this. I'll pay for it."
Since he had made his decision, there wasn't much more to say.
Li Long continued, "This matter definitely started in the second half of this year. What I'm telling you is that I think this matter is beneficial to our cooperative, so I acted first and informed you later. If anyone disagrees, they can speak up."
If there are too many people who disagree, our cooperative will abandon it, and I will go and cultivate another 1500 mu of land to do this.
Tao Daqiang was the first to speak: "Brother Long, what are you saying! You're doing this for the good of our cooperative. We're not fools, how could we disagree?"
Xie Yundong and the others laughed. He said, "Yes, how could we disagree with such a great thing? We knew there would be continuous benefits if we had said we would work with you. Look at this, we didn't put in any effort and just enjoyed the benefits."
Seeing that everyone agreed, Li Long nodded and said, "Alright, since everyone agrees, then it's settled. Our cooperative's drip irrigation tape will be supplied by my factory at cost. If other cooperatives want to do this in the future, then it can't be at cost price. This needs to be made clear first."
Moreover, when cotton prices rise, I won't be able to sell my drip irrigation tape to the cooperative at cost price.
This time, Xu Haijun spoke first: "This is only right. We shouldn't be selling at cost price in the first place. You're taking care of us now. If we continue like this after the price of cotton goes up, we'll really lose face. We can't do that."
Everyone else shared the same opinion, so it was essentially settled.
After finalizing these matters, Li Long returned to Old Ma's place.
He saw Li Yuhe sitting in the courtyard of the old horse shop, with a large basin in front of him and two buckets beside it. Li Yuhe was cleaning crabs. When he saw Li Long coming over, he quickly said, "Hey, Little Li, you're finally here. Come and relieve me."
This crab is so prickly! I was only focused on its two pincers while cleaning it, but all eight of its legs are also very sharp, and it pricked me several times!
Li Long rolled up his sleeves and walked over, saying, "Let me see how much you've washed. Quite a lot, about half a bucket. Okay, leave the rest to me."
He didn't even need to wear gloves. He took the brush from Li Yuhe, reached into the basin, picked up a crab, and started brushing it.
Li Yuhe looked somewhat surprised and asked Li Long, "Huh? Why aren't they grabbing you? Your grabbing technique is pretty good."
Li Long smiled but didn't reply, continuing to scrub. He thought to himself, "How many crabs did I catch in my past life? This thing is all about quick reflexes and aiming precisely at the carapace; otherwise, the crab can't pinch me." After scrubbing the crab's claws and legs, both sides, and rinsing them in water, he threw the clean crab into the bucket and picked up another one to scrub.
Seeing how fast and efficient Li Long was, Li Yuhe's hands started itching again. Wearing gloves, he tried to imitate Li Long's movements and grabbed a crab. However, he grabbed it in the wrong place, and the crab's claws flipped up and pinched him.
"Hey, I don't believe it!" Li Yuhe's stubbornness kicked in. He shook off the crab and grabbed another one.
By the time he had practiced catching seven or eight crabs, Li Long had already cleaned half a bucket of crabs.
Li Yuhe sighed. Although he had spent several years by the water, to be honest, he was no match for Li Long in this regard.
This time, he obediently assisted Li Long, which broadened his horizons and increased his experience.
At noon, Li Long personally stir-fried a spicy crab, while steamed crab was prepared on another stove. Following Li Long's instructions, Uncle Luo made a bowl of ginger and vinegar sauce.
When making spicy crab, Li Long chopped the crab in half, revealing a good amount of roe inside. He always makes a big pot of it. Since the ingredients were already quite fresh, adding the spicy and savory seasonings made it even better.
For lunch, Li Long and Uncle Luo acted purely as technical advisors. Li Yuhe and the others who did the work had never eaten crab before and didn't know how to prepare it.
Li Long and Uncle Luo have eaten their fair share; they might not be connoisseurs, but they certainly know their stuff. These freshly steamed crabs are easy to peel. You don't need any special crab-picking tools to get the meat out easily.
Li Yuhe ate while praising, "Fresh, so fresh! No wonder people in inland areas love to eat hairy crabs, this is really delicious!"
Li Long casually said, "Then I'll bring you some more when you leave. But make sure they're alive; don't eat the dead ones. Dead things are easy to upset your stomach and cause gastroenteritis."
Li Yuhe smiled but didn't reply. Li Long guessed that he thought Li Yuhe was trying to bribe him, so he didn't continue the conversation.
In the afternoon, Li Long took Li Yuhe to his elder brother's house to see high-horsepower tractors, cultivators, sprayers, and other equipment.
Li Yuhe took out his notebook and wrote down the models and quantities of all the tractors.
This is one of the items to be checked, since Li Long wrote it in the application report, so it has to be implemented.
On his way back, Li Long turned to the drip irrigation tape processing plant and told the workers that the equipment would arrive tomorrow, and asked them to prepare the ground and other materials.
Then Li Long took Li Yuhe to find an electrician. The team's electrician was a part-time worker with a small income. When Li Long mentioned that he needed to install three-phase power, he hesitated and said that he couldn't do it and that he had to contact the township's power supply company.
Li Long said to him, "Then you should talk to the township. Do you want me to take you there now? My machine will arrive tomorrow. It would be best to connect the power tomorrow so we can test it out."
"No need, no need, I'll just ride my bike and talk to them." The electrician knew Li Long's family wasn't short of money; anyway, installing the power lines and poles would cost extra. It was a source of revenue for the power supply station, so they would definitely be more proactive.
Seeing that Li Long had arranged everything clearly, Li Yuhe felt more relaxed. He figured he still had time in the afternoon and decided to go fishing again.
The old horse boat is only seven or eight hundred meters away from the small lake. Li Long said he had something to do, but Li Yuhe said he didn't need to worry about it and that he could go there by himself.
Li Long was genuinely busy, so I ignored him and drove to the county to find Sister Yang at the cannery to explain that I needed to borrow a few workers to help unload the machines the next day.
Now the cannery is expanding production and has hired a new batch of young, strong workers.
Sister Yang naturally had no objections and arranged eight people for Li Long.
It's still easy to recruit workers now. Li Long said that compared to 30 years from now, there is a real demographic dividend now, with a lot of young men who want to work in factories.
That evening, Li Yuhe wanted to go catch crabs again, but Li Long didn't show up no matter how long he waited. The cooperative and Lao Ma's shop didn't have phone numbers, so he couldn't contact Li Long. He also didn't dare go to the small lake alone, so he gave up.
I was thinking of telling Li Long when he came over tomorrow.
The next morning, after breakfast, Li Long didn't rush to the team. After dropping Mingming and Haohao off at primary school, he waited at the purchasing station.
Around 12 o'clock, four trucks drove up and parked at the entrance of the purchasing station.
It was peak season for collecting fritillaria bulbs at the purchasing station, and there were quite a few people in the yard, so these trucks didn't drive in.
As soon as Li Long saw the convoy arrive, he hurriedly went out to greet them. He didn't recognize the person leading the vehicles, but the person recognized him. He got out of the car with a smile and greeted Li Long, introducing himself as Officer Hou from the factory's transportation department, who had come specifically to deliver the equipment.
After shaking hands with him, Li Long invited the man in to sit and have some tea in the purchasing station's reception room, while he drove the purchasing station's truck to pick up the young men from the cannery.
Once everyone arrived, Li Long called over Officer Hou from the Transportation Department and the drivers, and the convoy set off for Team 4.
The convoy drove directly to the entrance of the drip irrigation tape processing plant, where Li Long saw power workers erecting utility poles.
Li Yuhe was watching the commotion from the sidelines when he saw Li Long arrive with his convoy, and he was genuinely surprised.
Li Long led the convoy directly into the factory yard and then instructed people to start unloading the equipment.
Officer Hou was clearly someone who did this often and was quite professional, guiding the workers as they carried the items down and packed them inside.
Li Yuhe walked over to Li Long and said with some doubt, "These are the drip irrigation equipment?"
Li Long nodded and said, "Yes, judging from today's progress, as long as the electrical frame is ready, we can start production."
The drip irrigation tape needed for those 1500 acres of land can be produced in just a few days.
He was so confident because one of the four trucks was carrying raw materials.
Old Du is truly exceptional in this regard. Knowing that Li Long was in a hurry, he specially arranged for a truckload of raw materials to help Li Long in his time of need.
Even though the equipment was right in front of him, Li Yuhe still wasn't entirely convinced.
But Li Long will make him believe it.
We'll see! (End of Chapter)