A production process crisis

His eldest uncle and his father took a stroll through town and brought home a bottle of Fenjiu.

His eldest uncle was delighted to see Yang Rui home. He patted his head, took a fountain pen from his briefcase, and handed it to him. "I heard you're going to take the college entrance exam again. You have my support. The factory issued this pen, but my old one's still good, so you can have it."

The fountain pen had a broad barrel and a narrow tip, a black body, and a dark blue clip that gleamed faintly. Yang Rui thought nothing of it, said "Thank you," and accepted it.

Rui's Mom snatched it away and said angrily, "Why do you just take whatever you're given? Brother, take it back for Xiaofeng. She'll be taking entrance exams soon, too."

"Feng'er already has one. This is for my nephew. Don't snatch it." His eldest uncle, Duan Hua, took the pen back, placed it in Yang Rui's hand, and closed his fingers around it. "Study hard and try to get into university. Make our family proud, make your parents proud, and secure a good future for yourself. Look at me and your dad. We've both suffered for lack of qualifications. Otherwise, why would we still be stuck in the township?"

"I haven't suffered." Unwilling to lose his authority in front of his son, Yang Rui's father said, "Back during the political struggles and armed clashes, if my qualifications hadn't been so low, I might well have ended up in the minority faction. It could've cost me my life. You choose your own path, but Heaven decides your fate. Thinking too much does no good."

Rui's Mom slapped her husband on the shoulder in anger. "What kind of father are you? Nothing but discouraging talk."

"I'm telling the truth. Forget it. Let's drink, let's drink..." His father took out two small liquor cups and concentrated on pouring.

With no way to deal with him, Rui's Mom told Yang Rui to put the pen away safely, then continued, "Don't listen to your father. The stubborn old fool can't bend his thinking. Study hard and find a good work unit after you graduate..."

Once a mother started lecturing, nobody could get a word in.

Yang Rui could only listen obediently while his father and eldest uncle drank in silence, exchanging meaningful looks as they clinked cups.

At the dinner table, Yang Rui gradually recalled more information about his identity.

His grandfather, Yang Shan, had been a child soldier in the war against Japan and the former Party secretary of Xizhaizi Commune. His father, Yang Feng, was the current township Party secretary of Xizhaizi Township. Between them, the two generations had made Xizhaizi Township an impregnable stronghold and were local emperors through and through.

However, both generations of the Yang family were extremely strict with themselves, believing in "sacrificing the family for the greater good." Not only did they take no benefits from Xizhaizi Township, which was practically their own backyard, but they also occasionally donated money and supplies to struggling residents, military families, families of fallen servicemen, and households receiving the Five Guarantees. As a result, their family had fewer assets than ordinary township employees. The original Yang Rui had also been influenced by his family, which was why he had chosen such an extreme course after failing the college entrance exam.

On the other hand, Yang Rui's maternal grandfather, Duan Hongsheng, was much more open-minded. Not only did he work at a state-owned enterprise himself, but he had also brought his entire extended family into various enterprises around the city. Of course, this was the fashionable practice of the day. Far from deserving criticism, it was considered a sign of the whole family's dedication.

Duan Hua, the eldest of the Duan siblings, had joined a factory in the sixties, choosing the highly sought-after Xibao Meat Processing Plant. To people back then, joining a meat processing plant meant not only a steady wage but access to meat and fat. In an era when people could barely fill their stomachs, the Xibao Meat Processing Plant was harder to get into than the county finance bureau and offered more tangible benefits.

Even in the eighties, the Xibao Meat Processing Plant remained an excellent enterprise within the city and even the province. Especially after it established its own cannery and leather factory, its benefits could be called luxurious. Employees could buy scraps such as backbone sections at extremely low prices and regularly received pork, offal, and other products. What most tempted workers from other factories were the rejects from the cannery's quality inspections. They required no meat coupons and were sold to employees at less than half price. That benefit alone was enough for the meat plant's sons-in-law to keep three mothers-in-law happy.

A few such rejects now and then could simply be divided among their own people, but too many would affect revenue.

As the cannery's deputy director in charge of production, Yang Rui's eldest uncle, Duan Hua, had long been plagued by the problem of defective products.

Unfortunately, canned pork ribs were themselves a relatively new product. He had approached several large factories for help, but none had solved the problem.

This time, Duan Hua wanted to find someone more capable through Yang Feng.

After several rounds of drinks, Duan Hua slowly set down his cup and got down to business. "Ever since the main plant changed Party secretaries, they've been pushing production far too hard. This time, we need someone who can really deliver. Could your contacts at the provincial animal husbandry bureau introduce us to an expert?"

Although Yang Feng was only a township Party secretary at the section-chief level, he had plenty of elders and friends, many of whom held provincial or municipal posts. Under heavy pressure from above, Duan Hua had immediately thought of his brother-in-law.

"They gave you a deadline?" Yang Feng immediately understood what was happening.

"They want results within three months. There are only two months left now. Tell me, can technical problems be solved like that?" Duan Hua rubbed his round nose and shook his head. "When they first installed this production line, they only sent a few green youngsters to Qingdao for three months of training. And look at it now. The pass rate keeps falling, and in the end, improving the process lands on my head."

"The pass rate hasn't been low for just a day or two. Why are they suddenly pushing you now?"

Duan Hua gulped down some liquor. "The municipal bureau is coming to inspect the production line's operation and grade the products. So the plant's getting anxious."

"Let the plant be anxious. Are we supposed to be afraid of them? Is our Duan family so easy to bully that they can sling mud at us whenever they please? If you're too embarrassed to speak up, I'll go talk to Li Datou. We helped him become plant director, too..." Rui's Mom's ferocity instantly won Yang Rui over.

A woman raised in a state-owned enterprise compound really was fearless.

Duan Hua gave a bitter smile. "It's not Li Datou. The main plant issued a directive. The new Party secretary came down from the light industry bureau. He's young and has connections. I figure he's here to take over from the old director. He's come up with a slogan: 'Out with the incompetent, up with the capable.' If the cannery's pass rate doesn't improve, I, the deputy director in charge of production, am the incompetent one, and his people are the capable ones."

The cannery was a branch of the meat processing plant, and all personnel arrangements were subject to the main plant. Although the Party secretary's position carried far less weight than the plant director's, rank could play a considerable role when the secretary himself had powerful connections.

"Is it the canned pork rib production line that has the low pass rate?" Yang Rui suddenly asked.

"That's the one." Duan Hua thought Yang Rui was merely curious.

"What's the current pass rate?" Yang Rui continued asking as he thought.

"Just over seventy-five percent."

Yang Rui inwardly shook his head, then asked, "What pass rate do you need to make the cut?"

"Well, look at you, showing concern for your uncle." Duan Hua chuckled twice but answered anyway. "To make the cut, we need at least an eighty-percent pass rate. Maybe eighty-five."

Even an eighty-five-percent pass rate was very low. In a market economy, a cannery like that would struggle to survive.

Yang Rui nodded slowly, comparing the strengths and weaknesses of various relevant papers in his mind.

Papers on canned pork ribs were concentrated in the late eighties and early nineties. It was a product that had appeared suddenly and disappeared just as suddenly, an attempt by some integrated meat enterprises to deal with large stockpiles of bone-in meat.

However, the fact that pork ribs were cheap enough to accumulate in the eighties did not mean they would always be cheap. Once their price rose, canned pork ribs naturally vanished without a trace.

Academia, sluggish as ever, would take another five or six years to begin addressing the practical difficulties enterprises faced. In other words, any expert his uncle brought in now would most likely have to start researching from scratch.

At this point, Rui's Mom asked worriedly, "If you don't make the cut, will you really lose your position?"

"It's very likely." Duan Hua tipped his head back and downed another cup, smacking his lips at the burn. "That Han fellow-the new Party secretary, Han Sen-likes using underhanded tactics. He knows a trick or two. The director's old and doesn't like getting involved. If the municipal bureau singles me out, he probably won't fight for me."

"Crooked tricks won't get him far. There are still two months, aren't there? I'll go to Yicheng tomorrow and find Old Mao. I'll bring you back a capable expert." Yang Rui's father made a firm promise, having also sensed the crisis.

"Good, good. I've gathered the technical section together. As soon as the expert arrives, we'll improve the production process." Duan Hua drained a full cup.

Still searching through the relevant papers, Yang Rui could no longer keep up the pretense.

He had very little faith in his uncle and father's plan. Experts were not gods. Without existing conclusions or research, even an expert could only begin compiling findings and conducting research anew, and that took time.

Second, adjusting a factory's production process also took time.

Completing both tasks within two months was naturally extremely difficult and would require a fortunate coincidence.

Yang Rui could not stand by and watch his eldest uncle gamble on luck.

In his memories, during the era of shortages, the meat and discounted goods his eldest uncle brought over had been the Yang family's main source of protein. The present Yang Rui also had his uncle's support to thank for the handsome body he had inherited.

Otherwise, with those two stubborn Party Secretaries Yang, he might not necessarily have gone hungry, but he certainly would have suffered far more.

With that thought, Yang Rui stopped concealing what he knew. He dipped a finger in water, drew a line on the tabletop, and said, "Uncle, does your pork rib production process start with precooking, then frying, followed by cutting into pieces, canning, sealing and sterilizing, and finally packaging?"

With each term, he marked a point on the line, matching the steps of the production process exactly.

"How did you know?" Duan Hua was astonished. This was an age of scarce information, not an information explosion. There was no internet, and even books and periodicals were scarce. People had difficulty finding the information they wanted. Even among food factory employees, a technician at a flour mill might know nothing at all about a cannery. Yang Rui had never even visited the cannery, so he had even less opportunity to learn about it.

Yang Rui looked utterly innocent. "Last summer vacation, didn't I go to the provincial capital and stay with Third Uncle for a while? I was always going to libraries then-the city library and the school library. I remember reading an article about canned pork ribs. I even did a little research..."

Not only had he explained where he had obtained the information, but he had also laid the groundwork for later.

Duan Hua noticed none of this. Torn between laughter and exasperation, he said, "You even did a little research? All right, tell me what you researched."

"There are four ways to solve the problem of protruding corners in canned pork ribs." Yang Rui's expression was just like someone announcing that there were four ways to write the character for fennel in fennel beans.

In fact, to him, they were much the same.