Chapter 148 Ministerial Meeting Part II

Once the report on trades and income ends, it's time to look at the place money was spent.

To start with, he would love to listen to the report on the sector he heavily invests in.

Education.

Riz turned his head to his former tutor and the current minister of education, Stuart Steven. Knowing his turn has arrived, he voluntarily stands up before the king calls his name.

Though it looks a bit rude, none of them speaks up. This meeting isn't the first time it was held. Last year, the king proposed to make this type of meeting annually which they had no problem with. Going by last year's sequence, Stuart is indeed the next person expected to present his report.

"Your Majesty, may I...?" The old minister is seeking his permission.

"Go ahead, Stuart. The floor is yours."

"Our kingdom's education plan last year was mainly based on the categorization of human settlement your majesty proposed. We, the ministry of education have built an educational district in each town and city.

In town, the district contains an elementary school, middle school, parks and small-size public libraries. While in the city except for Bideford, there are multiple elementary schools, multiple middle schools, high school, parks and large-size public libraries.

In the capital, Bideford, the scale is much bigger. The educational district here contains a high-capacity elementary school, high-capacity middle school, high-capacity high school, parks, University of Ryntum, Bideford Research Center and the largest public library with an estimation of one million registered items."

The categorization Stuart speaks about is Riz's idea of classifying human settlement based on its population to further manage the citizens efficiently.

Basically, settlements with less than 1,000 people are considered villages. 1,001 to 10,000 for the town. To get a city status, it must have a residing population of 10,001 to 100,000 people. Big cities come at the top for now with 100,001 to one million inhabitants.

Using this indicator, Riz can get the total population. His kingdom has 104 villages, 7 towns and 5 cities. At a minimum, the total population is around 320,000 people. A leap increase compared to two years ago.

Stuart continues, "Moving on, the literacy rate of citizens has increased to 95 per cent. The total number of teachers has stabilized since last year at 9,347 people. The military school in the north area have accepted the students starting last year. We can expect fully trained personnel two or three years from now. At the university level, we received many requests from foreign nations to allow their children, mainly nobilities to study at our university. Our wide range of courses which the scholars help categorize into multiple faculties has come to the attention of their rulers. What do you think, your majesty? Should we open our doors for them?"

"Let me read this first..." Riz is too engrossed in reading the 55-page report.

The effort put by the Ministry of Education in making this report is evident.

The report itself contains very detailed statistics and is well arranged. The budget spent, number of schools by their type, enrollment rate by type and gender, current number of teachers, teachers, teachers' age group and gender, number of enrollment in teacher training, public examination on each level of the school, passing rates, and future projection.

As Stuart said, the University of Ryntum offered many courses, categorized into many faculties;

Accounting and business,

Arts and communication,

Education and language,

Engineering and architecture,

Law and humanities,

Maths, science and technology,

Medicine science and health.

After being silent for nearly ten minutes, Riz eventually opens his mouth, "Our university can support 30,000 students in total, both in facilities and accommodations. Since our citizen's enrollment is only 20,000. I don't mind accepting foreign students but I have some conditions. The question is...are they qualified to attend our university?"

Every course offered has an entrance exam where one has to take. The difficulty is very high even for his own citizens who received multiple levels of education.

"This...I can't guarantee they would pass. Most of them are nobles and were personally tutored. The quality of education they received may differ."

"I don't actually mind though, as long as they passed the exam. If they can't pass, I don't want to hear any complaints." Riz lifted his finger, "However, I do have several conditions. First, limit their number and separate their accommodations. Second, the tuition fees charged must be doubled. Third, only accounting, law, education and arts are open. Fourth, accept only from Middle Jozia."

Riz doesn't want to be a bringer of knowledge. He isn't kind enough to accept students from just everywhere.

His kingdom has painstakingly built its own education structure in the past few years.

In his opinion, opening the door to the nearby kingdom is sufficiently kind. Spreading too far from Middle Jozia and Northern Inver region may come back biting him in the future.

"As you wish, your majesty. I'll send the terms and conditions to your office for verification by next week."

"Thank you, Stuart for your report. Without further ado, let's have Wendall, Minister of Food and Agriculture to present his report." Riz gave his cue to Wendall.

"The agriculture sector is mainly divided into four sub-sectors; crops, livestock, forestry and logging, and finally fisheries. The highest contributor among these four is the crops with 110.8 million Ryn, livestock followed closely behind at the value of 102.2 million Ryn, 80 million Ryn for forestry and logging and fisheries around 4.4 million Ryn. Since fisheries are still new to our kingdom, we estimated that the value would go up in the future. Especially when the Bideford-Rogvor Highway has been completed not long ago.

The added value of the agricultural sector for Year 302 is 297.3 million Ryn, an increase of an astounding 49.7 per cent as compared to 198.6 million Ryn in Year 301. In contrast to the increase in value, the number of persons engaged in agriculture decreased by 20 per cent. This decrement is justified due to farmers adopting the usage of farming machines as a replacement for humans. The details were written in the report."

"Is that so?" Riz reached out for the report. At present, their U-shaped meeting table is full of documents. He eventually found the said report after searching through a pile of documents.

The report titled "The Economic Statistic Report of Agriculture Sector Year 302" had a more specified output number for each type of crop. The same goes for livestock and fisheries. Average salaries and wages by sub-sectors were recovered as well.

According to the report, the total agricultural land in Ryntum in 302 is 73,000 square kilometres and it keeps growing. The lands are mainly concentrated in the south.

"The farming tool and machine...How did they obtain it?" Riz ask.

"Three big farming machine manufacturing companies which originally smiths are the main supplier. Although there are a lot more companies, these three are big players. They provide the farmers with the option of buying or renting. So far, we have received no complaints from the farmers."

"If there's no problem, then, it's okay. However, always open your ears."

"Thank you for the reminder, your majesty."