Chapter 476: Achievements of the First Five-Year Plan

When California was founded in 1851, the state government submitted the first five-year plan proposal to the state legislature and it was passed.

It is definitely inappropriate to describe California at the beginning of its establishment as poor and blank.

In 1851, California's industrial foundation was very poor, and the only things related to industry were some mining and handicrafts that emerged around the gold rush industry.

However, California in 1851 was not poor, and the per capita income was ridiculously high.

Until now, many people in California still miss the days when California gold diggers earned 1 ounce of gold a day.

In 1856, when the gold rush gradually cooled down, people who could earn 1 ounce of gold a day were definitely the wealthy class in California.

Of course, they only miss the income at that time, and no one will miss the prices, living standards and poor public security at that time.

This year is the last year of California's first five-year plan. Except for a few indicators that were not achieved five years ago, most of the indicators were achieved as scheduled.

In Tingtao Garden, Liang Yao flipped through the relevant data provided by the Statistics Bureau in 1855, which was last year, to provide reference for the formulation of the second five-year plan next year.

First of all, population data. Whether it is an industrial state in the north or an agricultural state in the south, population is the basic base of a state.

Even if the per capita income of a sparsely populated state is very rich, its upper limit will not be too high.

As the largest immigration state in the mid-19th century, California's data growth in this regard is very gratifying.

In 1851, the registered population of California was 140,000. In 1853, the population of California exceeded 500,000. In 1855, the number was 950,000, which was only a few steps away from breaking the million mark.

Now it is April 1856. Perhaps when Liang Yao was flipping through these data, California's population had already exceeded the million mark.

A population of 950,000 was at the middle level in the United States at that time, and it was definitely not a populous state.

In the past four years, California has not only had a strong momentum of population growth. The population structure has also been optimized, although California's population structure, especially the gender ratio, is still unbalanced.

But now women in California account for at least 31% of the total population, which is a great improvement compared to four years ago.

If California's economic growth momentum can continue, this situation will be further improved.

The world is so big, as long as your wallet is not empty, you don't have to worry about not finding a wife.

Many early immigrants who have made a fortune either return to their hometowns, go to the East, or start a family through other means.

Unmarried immigrants are basically new immigrants in the past one or two years.

Compared with other states, California's population is equivalent to North Carolina at this time.

But in fact, North Carolina's population is definitely larger than California, and it is much larger.

At this time, the attributes of blacks in the South are not people, but farm tools such as cattle and horses. Black slaves and even free blacks in slave states are often not included in population statistics.

If blacks are also included in the statistics, California's population in 1855 is actually at a lower-middle level.

In terms of population data, the free states in the North are far ahead.

The three most populous states in the United States are New York (3.6 million), Pennsylvania (2.7 million), and Ohio (2.1 million).

These three states are the only three states in the United States with a population of more than 2 million.

The three indicators that Liang Yao is most concerned about, steel, coal, and railway mileage, are very gratifying when compared with California in 1851.

In 1851, California's steel production was 16,000 tons, of which steel production was only 360 tons.

Liang Yao still remembers clearly that he wanted to lay steel rails at first, but in the end, due to California's poor steel production at the time, he had to give up and compromise with reality and use pig iron to lay rails.

In 1855, California's steel production suddenly increased to 115,800 tons, of which steel production was 7,560 tons.

California's coal production also increased from 350,000 tons in 1851 to 2.1 million tons in 1855.

The railway mileage increased from 0 kilometers in 1851 to 2,880 kilometers in 1855.

The goal set by the first five-year plan was that after the end of the first five-year plan, California's steel production must exceed 100,000 tons (steel production exceeds 5,000 tons). Coal production exceeds 2 million tons, and railway mileage exceeds 2,000 kilometers.

Of course, this is limited to vertical comparison with oneself.

If compared horizontally with the only superpower of this era, looking at the cold data can make people feel desperate.

Britain's steel production in 1855 was 3.4 million tons, pig iron production was 4.9 million tons, and coal production was 82 million tons.

The data for the United States in the same period were: 400,000 tons of steel production, 900,000 tons of pig iron production, and 17 million tons of coal production.

As the only country in the world that had completed industrialization at this time, the productivity of the British Empire was not only a dimensionality reduction attack on agricultural countries, but also a dimensionality reduction attack on other powers that were undergoing industrialization.

Britain and the United States are countries of the same size in terms of population. In the 1850s, the native population of Britain was just over 30 million, while the US population was approaching and surpassing Britain with its terrifying growth rate (mainly from immigrants).

The above goals are the main goals that California has achieved and will achieve during the first five-year plan.

In addition, California also has goals that have not been achieved.

This goal is the food self-sufficiency rate.

The first five-year plan required California's food self-sufficiency rate to reach 100% after the first five-year plan.

In 1851, California's food self-sufficiency rate was about 60%, and in 1855, this figure only increased to about 75%.

In order to achieve the goal of 100% food self-sufficiency in 1856, unless the Statistics Bureau made technical adjustments to the data in 1856 and was forced to complete self-sufficiency.

Otherwise, according to objective laws, this goal is impossible to achieve within a year.

The wasteland reclaimed before 1853 has now become cultivated land, and the guano dug from Noru is also open to farmers everywhere at a low price. The state government has also invested a lot in agricultural water conservancy facilities, and has also given farmers subsidies in agricultural machinery. California's agricultural tax has also remained at a very low level.

It stands to reason that with so many policy blessings, the Ministry of Agriculture should not hand in such an ugly answer sheet.

Liang Yao didn't understand. He sent a message to Chen Baoliang, the Minister of Agriculture, asking him to come to Tingtao Garden. He wanted to question the Minister of Agriculture in person about the reason.

"The population is growing too fast. No matter how fast we grow crops, we can't keep up with the number of mouths that need to be fed every year." Chen Baoliang said with a bitter face.

He had expected that one day, among all the ministers in California, the Minister of Industry would be the most comfortable, contributing more than 70% of the state's tax revenue, and he didn't have to look at people's faces wherever he went.

In contrast, his life as the Minister of Agriculture was not so comfortable.

Chen Baoliang also expected that Liang Yao would ask him to have a private talk. Perhaps after Liang Yao, the new governor would talk to him again.

"But the Immigration Bureau said that they give your Ministry of Agriculture a lot of immigration quotas every year. Are all the people in your Ministry of Agriculture all good-for-nothings? With so many immigration quotas and so many policies, you can't even achieve the basic goal of self-sufficiency in food?" Liang Yao looked at the table very unhappily, and his voice became much louder.

"This is not the Qing Dynasty! There is no shortage of land!"