Pioneer Lord: Starting From Daily Intelligence-Chapter 492 - 3: The Pressure of Food and New Wheat Seed (Part 3)

"How is the speed of these machines?" Su Li asked.

"Very fast. A single heavy plow can clear over 40 acres of fertile land in a day. It’s not that the plow’s speed is limited to that, in fact, if they run at full capacity, they can easily cover over 100 acres in a day. However, the serfs following behind need to clear rubble, level the land, dig out roots, and so on, which restricts their speed."

That’s still quite fast!

One machine can cover 40 acres a day, so 33 machines can open up over a thousand acres of fertile land in a day, and in a month, that’s more than 400 hectares of good land. 𝙛𝓻𝒆𝒆𝒘𝙚𝓫𝙣𝙤𝒗𝙚𝓵.𝙘𝙤𝙢

Perhaps by next year, Su Li could have 4000 hectares of land. This goal, once imagined, is not far off.

And this is just the rate of reclaiming new fields. Next year’s spring plowing and planting, the efficiency could be even higher, reaching one hectare per day without issue!

This means that next year the territory will have more leisure time to cultivate new fields, and these agricultural machines might also be rented out to various villages and farms after the plowing season, which not only brings in considerable wealth but also increases the size of various farms.

But this is not all of Bjorn Shallow Bay’s farming scale. Vandar continued: "Besides these Half-Elf devices, our territory has also produced more than 80 Nord heavy plows. So, the speed of recovery is very fast, what we need now is time, to let the serfs take care of the wheat fields and thus increase the harvest season’s yield."

Time is the one thing the territory does not lack at the moment!

After defeating the Green Dragon, the territory can finally produce in peace.

Su Li is filled with expectations for the winter harvest, especially after reactivating that Eye of the Storm, the territory will usher in a period of favorable weather.

Without severe natural disasters, Bjorn Shallow Bay will secure a solid harvest next time!

Su Li immediately said: "As for the Combat Rams, we have found a solution and will quickly breed a batch of rams for next year’s expansion. You should organize the Dawn Church to produce more production machinery and increase the scale of Blood Sacrifices."

These two aspects mentioned by Su Li are the focus of the territory’s farming activities.

Especially the scale of farmland for Blood Sacrifices, which will greatly affect the quantity of grain harvested.

Vandar nodded solemnly and said: "Our lumber camp has already started production again, with Half-Elf specialized logging machines, we can fell more than three thousand trees a day, enough to ensure major construction and still produce a batch of agricultural implements."

"However, the Blood Sacrifices aspect has made no progress. We have yet to find any trace of the next Polevik."

The trace of the Father of Grains, Polevik, will likely require Su Li’s intelligence to gather.

Su Li didn’t press the Dawn Goddess Church on this matter, and asked: "My minister, what is your estimate of how much grain we’ll harvest this season? Will we be able to support the populace until the next harvest?"

The baseline of one Copper Coin per pound of grain has been the Empire’s means of ensuring stability for thousands of years.

If grain prices exceed this, those at the bottom, who have been entirely exploited, could go hungry, their families might collapse into poverty and become slaves.

The biggest impact of the Green Dragon’s invasion was breaking the territory’s farming rhythm. If the third harvest this year isn’t abundant, next spring could see a desolate landscape. Many people might starve to death in the chilly spring weather before the summer harvest.

Vandar, as Minister of Agriculture, is most worried about this aspect, and he immediately frowned in response: "My Lord, this situation is not optimistic. Our territory’s greatest agricultural asset is undoubtedly the 1100 hectares of fertile land below Bjorn Shallow Bay."

"With our utmost efforts, those ruined fields have now been planted with winter wheat, but the grain yield will inevitably be affected. We estimate that even with buckwheat, peas, cabbage, and radishes, the total grain production will only be about 20,000 tons."

"It’s enough for the current size of the territory, but if the population grows rapidly, famine will inevitably occur."

Su Li calculated and felt that this food is indeed sufficient for the moment, and even if the territory’s population returns to 6000, there would still be a surplus.

Su Li then asked: "My minister, how could famine occur? Based on previous standards, this amount of grain should be sufficient."

Vandar sighed: "My Lord, you absolutely cannot calculate based on previous standards! Previously, the territory had five to six thousand commoners, slaves, and Armed Attendants, with only three to four hundred Elite Knights."

"But now, the territory and the Knight Orders, combined with the knights from the various Knight Order stations, number close to a thousand. These people are all big eaters, even consuming 2 to 3 pounds of meat per meal, and if they’re eating ordinary grain, even more is needed. Their daily consumption is astronomical."

That indeed is a problem.

Even on Earth, ordinary new recruits’ camps can deplete food subsidies quickly.

The consumption during training and combat of those young, vigorous guys far exceeds that of an office-bound worker.

And the knights in this world, with their extraordinary bloodlines, are even bigger eaters, out-eating Earth’s biggest gluttons.

This is also why the social mobility in this world is so low; a common family almost never produces a Knight.