Food: Selling Boxed Meals at a Construction Site

"This guy is something else!" the man muttered, stroking his chin with a thoughtful expression. "So he’s planning to build a Sea Ranch in Qianhai Town? If this is for real, maybe I can get a piece of the action!"

The man’s voice was low, but Xu An’s hearing was excellent. He caught the key words and glanced at the man impassively, but inwardly, a storm was raging. He not only recognized this man but knew with certainty that in his past life, this was the very person who had spearheaded the Jumping Fish farming project.

Right now, they were still several years away from when the project started in his past life, but he couldn’t be sure when this man had first gotten the idea. If the man beat him to the punch, the outcome might be the same as last time...

’Thinking of this,’ Xu An pushed through the dense crowd to his Second Grandpa’s side. He stood on his tiptoes and whispered in his ear, "Second Grandpa, isn’t this causing a bit too much of a stir? What if someone finds out about our plans and swoops in to steal them?"

"Haha!" Second Grandpa let out a hearty laugh, slapping Xu An’s back with a massive hand. "Not bad, not bad at all," he said, looking at Xu An with gratification. "You’re really learning to think from the village’s perspective. That’s good. Xu Family Village might be small, but our hearts are united. As long as we all pull in the same direction, our future will be bright."

After praising Xu An, Second Grandpa also lowered his voice, leaning close to Xu An’s ear. "I’ve already registered this piece of land with a few leaders in the city. The higher-ups are very supportive. Now we just have to wait for the professor to confirm there are no issues, and we can officially sign the contract."

"But you can never be too careful. I just saw quite a few people talking about this. Who knows what ideas they might be getting..."

Hearing Xu An’s words, Second Grandpa’s head snapped up and he scanned the surroundings. He did indeed see many people gathered in twos and threes, muttering to each other, and a sense of vigilance rose within him.

"Alright, you’ve got a point. Tonight, I’ll grab your Uncle Dongliang and have him write up the report. We’ll submit it as soon as possible," Second Grandpa decided on the spot.

Xu An looked at Xu Dongliang, his eyes full of sympathy. ’Sorry, Uncle Dongliang,’ he thought. ’Your sacrifice will bring happiness to all of Xu Family Village.’

While the two were talking, Professor Yu and his four students came up from the flats, carrying bags of all sizes filled with samples. Second Grandpa immediately left Xu An and hurried forward to take the samples from their hands. As he took them, his movements were incredibly gentle, a stark contrast to his rugged appearance, as if he were receiving a newborn baby.

"Professor Yu, how are the tidal flats?" Unaware of the fate that awaited him that night, Xu Dongliang squeezed over to ask as soon as he saw the professor come up.

Xu An noticed that the pot-bellied man had also followed behind Xu Dongliang.

"Not bad," Professor Yu said with a smile in his voice as he bent down to pull off his mud-caked rubber waders. "The ecosystem is quite healthy, and it doesn’t seem to be polluted. Based on what we see so far, it looks very promising."

"So, can we...?" He didn’t finish the sentence, but Professor Yu immediately understood what Xu Dongliang meant.

"We’ll only know the specifics after the sample analysis results are out."

"Do they need to be sent to the city for analysis? I can go get Brother Guosheng to drive you there."

"No, no, that’s alright. I have an old friend here. I just contacted him on the way, and he should be here soon." Professor Yu stuffed his discarded clothes into a bag and waved his hand in refusal. "It will probably take two days to get the results. I’ll contact you when they’re ready."

As they spoke, a black minivan pulled up on the side of the road. A man about Professor Yu’s age stepped out, his skin just as tan as the professor’s.

"Old Yu, what brings you all the way out here?" the man said, walking straight toward Professor Yu and greeting him familiarly.

"Well, I heard the marine resources were rich here, and since I’m doing surveys anyway, I thought I’d come take a look. And visit you, of course," Professor Yu said with a smile.

"If you’re talking about rich, you should see the mangrove forest to the south..."

"Oh, the town has a whole mangrove forest? I saw a few scattered trees over there and thought it was strange. This terrain and these tidal flats are perfect for mangroves to grow, so why are there so few?"

"Come on, I’ll take you south for a look."

Professor Yu followed the man to his vehicle, moved his luggage from the car Second Grandpa had rented, and then, after saying goodbye to everyone, left with his students.

Xu An watched Professor Yu drive away, then turned to find his little three-wheeler. He found Xu Lili hiding behind it, a terrified look on her face.

"Sister Lili, what’s wrong? Are you not feeling well?"

Xu Lili didn’t answer Xu An’s question. She peeked out from behind the three-wheeler, looking in the direction where the black minivan had been parked. Only after confirming that the vehicle was gone did she stand up with a sigh of relief.

"That scared me to death! The man who just came to pick up Professor Yu is my elective course professor. He caught me skipping his class once, and I almost failed."

...

The key figures had left, and the excitement was over. The crowd, most of whom hadn’t understood what the commotion was about, began to disperse. Xu An got on his three-wheeler to head back, but he’d only ridden a few feet before Second Grandpa called out to him, "Anzi, come to my house when you get back."

"Alright!"

As Xu An expected, it was another internal meeting concerning the development of Xu Family Village. This time, the topic was fundraising for the Jumping Fish farming project.

"I’ve made some inquiries in the city. These tidal flats have been available for three or four years, but no one has leased them. The total area is 15,000 mu, at a price of 210 yuan per mu. The maximum lease is for twenty years, with payment due annually."

HISS! Everyone present sucked in a sharp breath. The lease fee alone for these tidal flats would be 3.15 million yuan! That was much higher than anyone had expected. After contracting it, they would still have to invest in development. Five million probably wouldn’t even be enough!

"How about we lease half first? Once we’ve made some money, we can lease the other half. The pressure would be less."

"No. Sea farming isn’t the same as pond farming. If someone else leases the other half, it would be fine if they just focused on their own aquaculture. But what if they pull some kind of stunt? We’d be dragged down with them. We either lease all of it, or none of it," Second Grandpa retorted.

"That’s so much money. We couldn’t raise that much even if we sold off the entire Xu Family Village, people and all..."

"I’ve asked the city. The Rural Credit Cooperative has special interest-free loans for agricultural development, and our situation qualifies. For a lease fee of over three million, we only need to raise 1.2 million, and we can borrow the rest through this policy..."

"1.2 million? That means every household in Xu Family Village would have to chip in over a hundred thousand yuan to raise that much. That’s no small sum. We don’t have to worry about food or clothing, but not many families can just pull out tens of thousands, let alone over a hundred thousand," someone else interjected upon hearing the amount.

"Professor Yu said that if we meet the prerequisites for their ’Sea Ranch’ project, he can help us apply for some financial support, around 300,000 yuan. I’ve done the math. If every family in our village scrapes together what they can, 500,000 shouldn’t be a problem. But that leaves us with a 400,000 yuan shortfall, and that’s the tricky part." Second Grandpa sighed. "My initial plan was to raise the 1.2 million through loans, but the bank won’t accept that kind of fundraising. It has to be cold, hard cash, not borrowed money. So now we have two paths before us: either we find a way to raise the full 1.2 million, or we give up on sea farming and find another way forward!"

His words silenced everyone in the room.

"Second Uncle, I’ll be straight with you. I’ve saved up some money from the pork business over the years. I don’t have 1.2 million, but I can put up 200,000," Xu Guosheng said, gritting his teeth as he stood up.

"Second Uncle, my greenhouses don’t make as much as Guosheng’s family, but I’ve got eighty or a hundred thousand put away," said Aunt Hong. "I can contribute an extra 120,000!"

"Second Uncle, I can put in an extra 40,000."

"I’ll add 60,000."

"Thirty thousand."

"..."