Chapter 60

Chapter 52: Economic Development Bottleneck in Nanshan Town

The rain made the road slippery, turning the flat muddy path to Nanshan Town into a quagmire, splashing mud onto the Santana's body, leaving it spotted.

With the Spring Festival approaching, Su Nan, Yang Zixuan, Lin Ruoshui, and other county leaders were all visiting various towns and villages to console the five-guaranteed households, veterans, military martyrs' families, and other beneficiaries...

Today, Yang Zixuan and Lin Ruoshui were mainly visiting Nanshan Town, while Su Nan and other county leaders were visiting other towns and villages. Nanshan Town, bordering the Honghe District, is the second-largest town in Hongshui County. Although called a district, the Honghe District is not a true administrative district but merely a street office.

In Yang Zixuan's view, these visits had a showy component. He believed that to truly solve the people's problems, one needed to do some practical work with sincerity, not just superficial efforts. However, many leaders enjoyed such activities, especially Su Nan, who, having worked as a secretary for a long time, was enthusiastic about such consolation activities. Su Nan even brought the county TV station staff along for today's visit...

This made Yang Zixuan and Lin Ruoshui, the two young people, feel a bit nauseous.

"Last night, the county TV station broadcast a video of Secretary Su Nan's consolation activities. Secretary Su Nan looks quite good on camera," Lin Ruoshui seemed to think of something, her lips curling up, breaking the long silence in the car.

"Secretary Su Nan has good intentions, paying attention to the vulnerable groups in our county and informing the entire county that he has delivered the warmth of the Party and government to the poor..." Yang Zixuan said with a faint smile.

Lin Ruoshui chuckled but did not respond.

...

After Yang Zixuan and Lin Ruoshui's group arrived in Nanshan Town, they visited several poor villages under the accompaniment of the main leaders of Nanshan Town, visiting the people and delivering items like quilts and cooking oil.

Subsequently, a staff meeting was held in Nanshan Town. Yang Zixuan sat in the main seat, listening to the report on the town's work over the past year and their plans for the next year...

Yang Zixuan looked at Xu Ke, the Party Secretary of Nanshan Town, who was giving the report, sizing up this middle-aged man. At the Standing Committee meeting, Lin Ruoshui had strongly recommended that Xu Ke be transferred to the Honghe District as secretary, but due to the strong opposition from Su Nan and Huang He, it did not succeed.

Therefore, Yang Zixuan was also curious about what skills Xu Ke had that could win the favor of Lin Ruoshui, the beautiful deputy secretary.

In Yang Zixuan's view, although Lin Ruoshui had a flexible mind in state-owned enterprise economics, she lacked the necessary experience and ability in party affairs and grassroots work. Now, despite her strong background, Lin Ruoshui had not been able to form a strong and substantial check on Su Nan. With the cooperation of Su Nan and Huang He, Lin Ruoshui was gradually at risk of being completely sidelined. In personnel matters, Huang He often bypassed Lin Ruoshui, the deputy secretary of the Party Committee, and reported directly to Su Nan, putting Lin Ruoshui in a very passive position. Moreover, in the Party Secretary meetings, Lin Ruoshui's voice had been significantly marginalized by Su Nan.

This was undoubtedly very frustrating for Yang Zixuan, who had thought that Lin Ruoshui would be enough to check Su Nan, but now that possibility was slim...

Without worrying about Lin Ruoshui's check, Su Nan could free up time and resources to fully focus on dealing with Yang Zixuan, which was also a headache for Yang Zixuan!

"County Chief, next year, Nanshan Town will rely closely on the medicinal herb industry to promote farmers' income growth and strive to make further progress on the basis of this year's economic development!" Xu Ke reported cautiously, afraid of being caught by the young county chief and asked a difficult question.

He had heard many rumors about this young county chief, such as his outburst in the office against the very experienced Planning Commission Director Lan Le, and his strong push for the approval of the economic development zone construction plan at the county Party group meeting!

Therefore, this time when Yang Zixuan came to Nanshan Town, Xu Ke and the other town officials were also very cautious, afraid of running into the county chief's volcano and having an unpleasant New Year.

Yang Zixuan nodded. This Xu Ke did have some ability, no wonder he had won Lin Ruoshui's favor. The Nanshan Town Party Committee and government had a clear understanding of their town's advantages and industrial positioning, focusing on medicinal herb cultivation and production to build a medicinal herb production chain. This alone made Yang Zixuan look at Xu Ke more favorably.

Nanshan Town is a well-known medicinal herb distribution center in the western part of Luofu Province, surrounded by high mountains and planted with a large number of medicinal herbs. Various medicinal herb trading and wholesale businesses are thriving, and the living standards of the townspeople are relatively high. It is one of the most distinctive towns in Hongshui County in terms of development.

Nanshan Town has long been known as a natural medicine repository, with a thousand-year history of medicinal herb cultivation. It produces a wide variety of medicinal herbs, including Polygonum multiflorum, Ganoderma lucidum, Bupleurum, and Eucommia, among over a thousand types. Many medicinal herb traders come to Nanshan Town for transactions this year.

"Old Xu, your town committee's thinking is correct. Focusing on the cultivation and production of medicinal herbs is an important means of increasing the income of the townspeople, but you should also appropriately shift your thinking and not just focus on medicinal herb cultivation," Yang Zixuan gently tapped the table and looked at the standing Xu Ke.

Lin Ruoshui, sitting beside him, also listened intently. Not long ago, she had reviewed the revised plan for the Honghe Economic Development Zone proposed by the Hongshui County government. There was no doubt that the revised plan had a very clear development strategy and plan for the entire Hongshui County, and these plans were tailored to the local conditions, fitting the development needs of Hongshui County, not just theoretical castles in the air! One could say that as long as there was an execution-capable team to implement the plans in the revised document, plus strong support from Daming City, Hongshui County could truly enter a period of vigorous development.

After reviewing the revised plan, even Lin Ruoshui had to admit that Yang Zixuan was indeed skilled in economic matters.

Since taking office as the deputy secretary of the Party Committee, Lin Ruoshui had also studied Nanshan Town, which has a distinctive economic development feature. In her view, the main leaders of the Nanshan Town Party Committee and government were quite capable, actively helping farmers contact external medicinal herb traders, and frequently inviting experts from the Luofu Provincial Medical College to guide special medicinal herb cultivation, explaining in detail the functions and values of various medicinal herbs to avoid farmers being cheated by traders.

Therefore, in Lin Ruoshui's view, the Nanshan Town Party Committee and government had put a lot of effort into increasing farmers' income, which was why she had initially proposed transferring Xu Ke to the Honghe District as secretary...

But now, it seemed that Yang Zixuan was still somewhat dissatisfied with the work of the town committee and government, which piqued Lin Ruoshui's curiosity, and she couldn't help but listen intently...