The ripples stirred up by the cooperative's dividend distribution slowly spread through the Fourth Team, reaching the entire brigade and even the township.
Cooperatives as a production model had appeared more than twenty years earlier, but communes had soon replaced them, so quite a few people did not understand their purpose.
Or rather, they did not understand their specific purpose under the current household responsibility system.
So when Li Long and the others' cooperative turned a profit after its first year, it challenged many people's thinking.
Working alone was possible, but no household could equip itself with every kind of farm machinery. Even if it could, it would not have enough people to operate them all.
That was where strength in numbers showed its advantage. Establishing a cooperative, dividing the work sensibly, and strictly enforcing its rules and regulations still seemed to offer considerable hope of making money from the land.
So not only did quite a few people in the Fourth Team want to learn from them, people in other production teams began considering the idea too.
The day after the dividends were distributed, people came asking about the rules and regulations for establishing a cooperative. They mainly came looking for Xie Yundong.
But Xie Yundong was not home at the time. Deng Guilan told the visitors that he had gone to the team leader's house.
At Xu Chengjun's house, Li Long and Xie Yundong sat on the sofa, waiting for the team leader to finish what he was doing.
Xu Chengjun had finished eating not long before when a call came from the township, and he was answering it.
Ma Hongmei brought over sunflower seeds and tea. In winter, that was basically the standard offering in the countryside. Some hardworking people willing to learn would wash and roast