Struggle in the Steam Age

Next, take advantage of the time when the ship is unloading. Viscount Surrey told Lawrence and another viscount about the food storage on Green Island.

"We considered stockpiling a large amount of food to keep our food supply safe, but after much discussion it became clear that there was neither the money nor the storage space on the island to do the job."

"More importantly, the harbors on our island are relatively poor. In winter, there may be strong winds or ice floes. Once a ship carrying grain encounters these things, it may take several days to dock, so that the shore will There is a food crunch."

"The big ships that bring food to the island are doing better, but the small ships that distribute food from the big ports to the various territories are more difficult."

"In my impression, many territories further north had the experience of seeing ships outside the port but unable to unload their cargo, and they themselves could only starve. Even after a severe cold wave came five or six years ago, even our Large settlements around the border have been starving for a long time."

Obviously, for efficiency reasons. The food transported into the island from outside the island is often unloaded at the ports around the large gathering area, and then sent to various territories by these ports through some offshore ships.

The biggest advantage of this delivery method is that it can distribute these materials to everyone who needs them in the shortest time, which is the best from the perspective of efficiency.

But the corresponding problem is that the safety problem in transportation is very obvious: these small offshore sailing ships resist, and Song Ying often has the situation that the goods cannot be delivered on time.

Not to mention the land transportation, even without considering the cost, the scarcity of sleighs pulled by reindeer and the long transportation process are basically impossible to meet the needs of the island residents.

What's more terrible is that these reindeer actually consume a lot of food in the process of transporting goods. And this level of consumption is almost impossible to accept for Green Island, where every grain is very important.

"It's the same as our side. Almost all transportation depends on sea transportation." The baron who came with the team nodded with emotion, and then looked at Baron Surrey and asked.

"You just said that in order to solve these food safety problems, you ordered a large amount of oil and sugar from us, so can you tell me how you use these oils and sugar?"

At this time, Lawrence also looked at Baron Surrey with a puzzled look, because he couldn't see any better place to replace the original grain with oil and sugar.

Yes, these two things are indeed much larger than grains in terms of calories, but these things are just food additives after all. Relying on these things alone can't fill people's stomachs. If you want to be full, you must have other food intake.

"Because we found that if people eat more oil, water or sugar, then their need for grains will be significantly reduced."

Viscount Surrey expressed his simple conclusions after observation. "Compared to those bulky grains, both sugar and these vegetable oils are much smaller in size and easier to store."

It has to be said that Viscount Surrey's statement is indeed reasonable, because Lawrence knows that if a person consumes a lot of sugar and fat, then their consumption of grains and the like will naturally be greatly reduced.

The principle here is very simple, because the daily calorie consumption of each person is fixed, and the unit calorie of both sugar and fat is much higher than that of grain.

The same is true for preservation issues. Preserving all kinds of food on this cold and dry northern island is much simpler than the tropical area where Lawrence is located.

Compared with the original grains, not to mention that the sugar can be preserved for a long time in a dry, cool and dark environment, even the oil that these merchants transported by ship is the best preserved palm oil among vegetable oils.

Of course, compared with those shelled grains and sugar, palm oil does have a shorter shelf life. However, it is not a problem to store it in the local dug out light-proof and low-temperature cellars for one or two years, and this is enough for the island.

It was because of this thought that so many people on the island ordered a large amount of sugar and oil from these islands in the southeast sea area of ​​the Star Sea represented by Lawrence.

And this kind of business is also a very good business for the various islands in the Sea of ​​Stars. Although it is said that the current shipments of each company are not too much, after reading Lawrence's analysis report, they all think that this market has great potential. .

Unlike the trade in which the lords of the Star Sea usually sell all kinds of materials with n hands in the middle, although the business of direct sales users from these places of origin needs to pay the shipping fee, the selling price is also significantly lower than the market price. But even so, the profits of each transaction are higher than before.

Obviously, for most businesses, it is indeed a better thing for both buyers and sellers to have no middleman to earn the price difference, at least both parties can get more benefits.

"Oh, by the way, we also brought a few chefs this time." Just as the cargo was about to be loaded and unloaded, the baron from Star Sea pointed to a man wearing a windbreaker and walked off the ship.

"We paid a lot of money to hire this cook, who has a knack for adding fat and sugar to all kinds of diets—"

Obviously, these nobles from Xingchenhai attach great importance to this transaction. So they even hired professionals to help them sell their goods, and this approach really had an immediate effect.

"This is simply amazing!" Viscount Surrey suddenly showed a happy look. "Not many people here have seen these tropical specialties in the past. It is really helpful for us to hire chefs who are good at this."

When all the goods on the ship were removed, the local specialties that had been gathered on the port before were also sent to the ship.

In addition to buckskin and deerskin, local specialties include some seal skin, otter skin, spices, oil and bones of fish in certain cold regions.

The last two items were purchased by Lawrence, because in his previous experiments, he found that this world has one thing in common with the last world, that is, the medium fish oil that lives in the cold zone contains a lot of nutrients. So he needs these things to make some medicine.

To be precise, Lawrence planned to use the deep-sea fish oil in these cold regions to make some health products, and then sell them to the rich to make a lot of money.

The reason why he has this idea is also very simple, because before selling medicines on the island, he only kept a low profit, so now he needs to let those medical institutions make more money.

As for the reason why the profit of medicines is not high, it is also very simple. It is because with the rise of the extraordinary level, Lawrence has also begun to be affected by Bai Ze's blood in many places.

As a divine beast of the good camp, Bai Ze's bloodline naturally caused Lawrence, a bloodline warlock, to shift his entire camp in the direction of goodness.

It may be because Lawrence's bloodline was obtained through Jianmu, so it's not like some bloodline masters can't change their tendency unconsciously under the subtle influence of the bloodline.

But a very bad fact is that Lawrence also knows from his blood that if he does something that goes against Bai Ze's blood, his extraordinary level will stagnate, or even regress significantly.

And driving up the prices of these life-saving medicines is obviously against Bai Ze's nature.

Considering that this world is a world where extraordinary power belongs to itself, Lawrence naturally chose extraordinary power between extraordinary power and worldly money.