Chapter 418 21. Farmers All over the World Suffer
Yamauchi Yoshiharu looked at the jito who was kneeling on the ground for a while, and then thought about it.
"Sakuheiji?"
"Yes, yes, it's me. What do you want, Your Highness?" The jito didn't even raise his head when answering, but his excitement at being remembered by Yamauchi Yoshiharu was beyond words.
"Go get a sickle." Yamauchi Yoshiharu ordered.
"Okay!" The jito and the landowner ran back to the village in a flash, and in a few minutes a large group of people ran to the ridge of the field with their hands and shoulders.
Sickles for cutting rice, bamboo poles for drying rice, straw hats, paper umbrellas, new straw sandals and cloth socks to replace, and buckets filled with clean water. Basically everything that can be brought was brought here, and the jito was very thoughtful.
"Sakuheiji, give the sickle to Taro."
Hmm? ……………
That's not right!
Shouldn't Yamauchi Yoshiharu go to the field to cut rice in person, showing that he loves the people like his own children, and the monarch and the people are one family! Giving a sickle to a three-year-old Taro is useless. He has a hard time holding a sickle, and he can't cut rice.
"Hey, Taro is still young, let me help him cut the rice." The magistrate saw that Yamauchi Taro was so small.
"No need, let Taro cut it." "Hey, big brother, Taro is still young, it will be bad if he gets hurt." Yamauchi chief accountant came over to persuade him.
"Taro! Go pick up the sickle!" Yamauchi Yoshiharu ignored his brother's dissuasion.
Yamauchi Taro had no choice but to take the sickle in the magistrate's hand. A sickle is naturally not heavy for an adult. But for a child over three years old, it is a bit difficult.
"Come, watch how I cut rice, you cut it too." After saying this, Yamauchi Yoshiharu picked up the sickle, gently pulled it, and cut a bunch of rice.
People who have experienced farming should know that rice stalks seem to be easily broken, but in fact they are quite tough. If you use a sickle to cut rice, if you can't cut along the blade slightly obliquely, you will feel very tired if you can't get two bunches.
So the rice stubble in the fields where farmers cut rice by hand without machine cutting actually looks very neat. If you use brute force to cut it, you will be exhausted and can't cut a few bunches.
Yamauchi Taro's cutting posture is wrong, and he has no strength. Even if there are more than ten rice plants in a bunch, he can't cut it at all. He yelled, and finally threw away the sickle, and pulled out the rice one by one, making his hands and face full of mud, but he only got a dozen rice plants.
Xiao Pingtai saw that Yamauchi Taro's little head was covered with sweat after a while, pretending to be watching, but actually quietly stood over to help him block the sun completely.
Yamauchi Yoshiharu was about to say something, but opened his mouth, after all, he was his grandson.
Others were worried. How could such a young child do farm work? Moreover, this child had been living a life of luxury since childhood and had never suffered any hardship.
"Don't stop! You have to keep cutting if I don't allow you to!" Yamauchi Taro was so tired that he sat down on the ridge of the field. But Yamauchi Yoshiharu did not allow him to stop and ordered.
Yamauchi Taro cried out "Wow". He had never suffered such hardship before. When did his grandfather, who loved him so much, become so strict?
After crying, the Yamauchi retainers could not sit still. Some held umbrellas, some fanned, some wiped sweat, and some fed water. After a flurry of activity, Yamauchi Taro stopped crying.
Yamauchi Yoshiharu sighed and stopped forcing Yamauchi Taro. After stopping sobbing, Yamauchi Taro looked at his grandfather in disbelief, his eyes red.
Yamauchi Yoshiharu picked up Yamauchi Taro, walked to the owner of the field, and asked Yamauchi Taro to look at him.
"Tell Taro, how many times have you eaten rice this year?"
"Your Highness..., I ate it twice this year, once on New Year's Day and once when I went to battle." The owner of the field stammered.
"Taro, how many times have you eaten rice this year?" "Every day?" Yamauchi Taro, who didn't have a good sense of time, knew that he ate rice every day.
"Come on, open your mouth for Taro to see."
Yamauchi Taro immediately covered his nose with his little hand. He saw a mouth full of rotten teeth, which were worn out and almost rotten black, with a pungent smell.
"Take some barnyard grass and bran."
"Taro, try it!"
How could Yamauchi Taro, whose teeth had only grown for a short time, eat barnyard grass and bran? Once they entered his mouth, he felt hoarse and couldn't chew them. He spit it all out before chewing it twice.
"It's not delicious, it's not delicious." Yamauchi Taro shook his head.
"Isn't it delicious? But this is what the people eat every day! They can hardly eat the rice they grow themselves!"
This made Yamauchi Taro hard to believe. The thinking of children is so simple. Even the smart Yamauchi Taro didn't understand how those weeds and rice bran could be eaten by people.
"This person grows rice by himself, but can't eat rice. He also has to fight for our Yamauchi family!"
"Every such people is the pillar of the Yamauchi family, and every rice plant is the pillar of the Yamauchi family!"
"This is as important as fighting! You can't take it lightly!"
Although Yamauchi Taro still didn't quite understand, at least today's events left a deep impression on him. I'm afraid he will never forget this incident in his life.
"The people of the territory live in poverty. Taro, as a daimyo lord, you must be kind and love the people and put people first in the future!" [Note 1]
After saying this, he handed the sickle back to Yamauchi Taro and asked him to remember this.
Murakami Yoshimitsu, who followed him, quickly took out money and bought the sickle from the local lord. After much resistance from the locals, they forced it upon the people.
Then the group returned to the city.
[Note 1]: The writer would like to say a few more words. Apart from the big landlords and big farmers in Japan, the life of ordinary small-scale individual farmers is still "difficult" today (except for the food and clothing brought by social development!).
The so-called happy life of Japanese farmers on the Internet is partly true, but also a lot of beautification. Farmers in the world are generally miserable. Regardless of China or abroad, farmers are really always at the bottom of society and their lives are really miserable.
I don’t know if you eat KFC. Now there are two kinds of ice cream cones, Shikoku grapefruit flavor and Okayama white peach flavor, which happen to be local specialty fruits in Japan.
Let’s talk about the price of Okayama white peach in the fruit market in Tokyo. One is 1,000 yen, which is 60 yuan. Is it expensive? Are Japanese farmers making a fortune?
Wrong! The average age of farmers who grow Okayama white peaches in Japan is over 60 years old, and there are almost no young farmers who have just joined the planting! There is only one reason! Not making money, extremely not making money!
Some Okayama white peach farmers are so poor that they can't even afford rice. They have to abandon their peach orchards and work part-time to make ends meet.
The reason is the existence of the Japanese Farmers' Association! It forcibly stipulates the number and standards of Okayama white peaches that can be put on the market. They cannot be too big or too small. Even if the harvest is good, it will rot in the fields and cannot be sold through the Farmers' Association.
The Farmers' Association's purchase price is not disclosed publicly, and I don't know what the price is. But it is obvious that it is difficult to maintain the lives of farmers.
At this time, someone asked? The Japanese Farmers' Association is so overbearing, why don't Japanese farmers withdraw from the association and sell it themselves?
The answer is almost impossible!
If you withdraw from the association, almost all shopping malls and convenience stores in Japan have signed an agreement with the Farmers' Association not to sell agricultural products that have not been wholesaled by the Farmers' Association. That's fine, some people say to sell online. Unfortunately, Japanese agriculture is also connected to the Internet.
Farmers can only sell on the street and at their doorsteps, and there is no channel to sell at all.
That's fine, but the most exaggerated thing is that farmers who return the products will automatically lose all agricultural insurance, and all agricultural machinery, fertilizers, seeds, and pesticides are controlled by the farmers' association. If you withdraw from the association, you can't even buy a bag of fertilizer, which directly cuts off your possibility of farming.
Let's talk about Shikoku grapefruit. Take Uwajima as an example. It has been the most important citrus crop production area in Japan since the Edo period.
In the most prosperous period of the Meiji era, there were 5,600-5,900 households and more than 40,000 farmers engaged in citrus fruit cultivation, and the output accounted for more than one-third of Japan's total! Under the unremitting efforts of the Japanese Farmers' Association for 70 years after the war, the number of farmers has become 1,800-1,900 households, and the output has weakened to less than one-fifth of the national total.
Similarly, for one tangerine, the purchase price of farmers is as low as 4 yen, which is 20 cents and 4 cents in RMB.
It is also stipulated that large and small ones are not accepted, and only a certain number of citrus farmers are purchased each year to ensure the market price, and cruelly squeeze the citrus farmers in Uwajima.
Often, 200,000 oranges are sold, earning 800,000 yen. After paying agricultural insurance fees, deducting the costs of water, electricity, fertilizer, and pesticides, not counting the labor of farmers, this mere 800,000 yen is almost exhausted.
Citrus farmers work hard from the beginning of the year to the end of the year, not only do they not make a penny, but they also have to pay money! Life has reached a point of dire straits, which is almost unbelievable!
If there are people who travel to Uwajima, Shikoku, Japan now, you will really find that the citrus groves all over the mountains are all left to rot or even abandoned.
It's not that they don't want to plant, but they really can't plant and can't afford it!
And what has the Japanese Farmers' Association reached? Because it controls the farmers, in the last parliamentary election, the Farmers' Association recommended a total of 40 candidates, and 36 were elected. It far exceeds the so-called election success rate of the ruling and opposition parties.
Due to the problem of review, the deeper content and the current situation of many farmers in our country are not dared to be mentioned at all.
In short, Japanese farmers are suffering from cruel oppression that is even more exaggerated than in feudal society.
I just want everyone to know that farmers in the world are suffering, really suffering, too suffering! Farmers are the only ones who suffer in the world!