Yindu, Punjab.

After entering late July, the wheat in the field has begun to be fully harvested, and the purchase price of wheat has risen by 40% again compared to when Riksh sold it a month ago.

This is a terrifying number because it means that the price of wheat in the entire Yin City has risen by nearly 100% in just 4 months.

The farmers around him cheered and cheered, but Ricksh saw something deeper.

This is very wrong.

Because the price of flour has hardly increased.

The price of wheat has risen, but the price of flour remains unchanged. So what are these flours made of? Is it the low-priced wheat stocked last year?

But if there is still low-priced wheat in the inventory, why do these merchants want to buy this year's wheat at a high price?

This is illogical.

Looking at the workers who were coming and going to carry wheat for merchants, Riksh's brows became tighter and tighter.

Something has to be done.

According to his plan, it will take two weeks for his own wheat to start harvesting, which means it will take at least two weeks before he can get enough money to buy flour.

But according to the current trend, he does not think that the price of flour can be maintained at the current level for more than two weeks.

So, he has only two choices.

Either harvest wheat in advance or borrow money to buy flour and food.

However, no matter which solution it is, it is not an easy task for him. There are indeed wealthy families in the village who will issue loans, but the interest rates of those loans are so high that each transaction is calculated according to the sky. No one is willing to borrow it until the verge of life and death.

But what’s ridiculous is that in this country, there are too many poor people on the verge of life and death every day, so their business is ridiculously good.

After a long silence, Riksh made a decision.

Harvest wheat!

Even if the harvest now may be more than 10% less than in two weeks, this is still an almost negligible number compared to the interest on the loan.

He stood up and walked into the house to call his wife and daughter out. Then, the two of them carried tools to the small wheat field at their home.

On the way, his wife tentatively asked him why he was harvesting the wheat now. He could not explain the logic himself, so he could only tell his wife that this was God's will to him.

However, this reason seems to be more convincing than scientific logic. In the subsequent work, my wife did not ask another question.

Naturally, human labor cannot compare to machines, but after working in the scorching sun for three days, they still collected all the wheat and sold it out at an unprecedented high price on the same day.

Then, Riksh took the amazingly thick banknote and hired a donkey cart into the city without stopping, and purchased a truck full of flour and food from the grain store, which was enough for the family to eat for more than half a year.

This cost him 70% of his money. From the remaining money, he took out a portion of it to buy new shoes for his daughter, a sari for his wife, and an axe for himself.

He didn't know why he needed an axe, but the moment he saw it, he immediately felt that he had to buy it.

Maybe it will come in handy one day?

But Rickash can't think of the answer for the time being what it is for what it is.

The only thing he knows is that at least for the next 9 months, his family will not go hungry.

...

However, foresighted farmers like Riksh are rare in this place where the per capita literacy rate is less than 10%. Most farmers, after selling their hard-earned wheat, leave a portion of their savings based on experience and current food prices, are spent on debt repayment, purchasing consumer goods, or some necessary but less urgent activities.

In this month, there were more weddings in the small village where Riksh was located than in the whole year last year.

The whole village was thriving, and some merchants even started to use trucks to pull electrical appliances and electronic products to sell them in the village - even if the village was in a power outage for at least 9 months of the year.

However, this did not affect the sudden large amount of money in the farmers who had suddenly had to satisfy their vanity with consumption. When Ricksh was still out of work in a mess, none of his friends were laughing at him.

"It's time for you to change your clothes, Ricksh, your clothes are torn to make a nest for my dog."

"You should take good care of yourself and get a haircut -- maybe at least wash your face?"

"This is the latest phone, why don't you buy it? Are your money hidden under your bed?"

"You won't give the money to your wife, right? That's it? Why don't you ask her back? Beat her hard!"

...

Ricksh ignored all such vague and malicious words.

He could fully understand the psychology of these people. When everyone was doing the same thing, a unique person became an alien.

Now, my so-called "wealth-keeping slave" has naturally become an alien.

They didn't know that their money had been spent on low-priced food, and they would never reveal this secret.

This is a kind of pessimism buried deep in his heart.

From these laughing crowds, he vaguely smelled some corruption.

And when he was very young, he had actually smelled this kind of breath - from the scent of the corpses who died of starvation and died on the roadside.

After returning home, Rekash closed the yard gate and began to continue his excavation work.

He wanted to dig a cellar, and after closing it, it could only be opened from it, and stored enough water and food, and air could circulate.

This is what he can do, the final preparation.

...

As Ricksh expected, the inversion of raw materials and finished products did not last long. One day in early August, as if he had suddenly received some order, the prices of flour and food in the Yindu market suddenly began to soar.

On just one day on August 1, the price of flour suddenly rose by 20%.

Subsequently, the price of 500g white bread, which is the largest consumption in the entire Yindu market, soared from Rs 37 the day before to Rs 49.

Then there was rice, with the price from Rs 54 per kilogram to Rs 65 per kilogram.

Subsequently, the price increase effect was further transmitted, and the prices of milk, eggs, meat, potatoes, and even drinking water all ushered in a comprehensive increase. According to the official news released by Yindu, within this month, the national consumption index rose to 9.2%, once again setting a new high in the past 10 years.

A terrible inflation is about to come, but what is even more terrifying is that even under such price increases, food still has a shortage of supply, and the price increase rate has not slowed down at all.

It was not until this moment that the bloated and slow bureaucratic system in Yindu finally realized the danger later.

They are not afraid of inflation, because every inflation will make them a big profit, but they are afraid of famine.

After just a few days of discussion, Yindu officially issued a policy to ban the export of flour and wheat, but by this time, it was too late.

----In other words, even if this policy was promulgated from the beginning, it actually has no meaning.

Because a considerable portion of the wheat purchased at high prices is actually still left in China.

As for the reason?

It's just a deal with some international grain traders.

The purpose of those companies is not in Yindu at all, so they do not intend to invest too much money here. Since this is the case, they will hand over part of the market to local grain merchants in Yindu to make them play the role of hoarding.

After all, it is for making money. As long as someone takes the lead in starting it, these local grain merchants will even be faster than international grain merchants.

And of course their methods are even more fierce.

Can't collect grain? Farmers are unwilling to sell grain?

That's great, you can start robbing openly.

Officials need to check?

More than 600 counties in 28 countries and 28 counties across the country are all our people. What are you looking for?

Even the official core institutions have no way to deal with them.

Therefore, under such a complex game of force, the situation in Yindu became worse and worse.
Chapter completed!