Chapter 522: Gatekeepers of Great Powers
Late 1879.
The light rainy season that was supposed to arrive has not arrived. Not surprisingly, it triggered a drought in eastern East Africa. This drought affected two important agricultural production areas in East Africa, one is the coastal plain, and the other is the East African Plateau drought. for agricultural production areas.
The Great Lakes Region has not had much impact. Benefiting from the geographical location of the Great Lakes Region, it can enjoy some residual water vapor from the Congo Basin. In addition, the Great Lakes Region is already rich in water resources, so it will not have much impact.
“This rainy season has not arrived due to special reasons, so we must do a good job in dividing water sources, and at the same time, the release of water from reservoirs must be carried out in a timely manner to ensure the steady development of agricultural work.”
"According to local reports, five eastern provinces will be affected, including Central Province, Oriental Province, Neu-Württemberg Province, Plateau Province and South Salzburg Province, so this drought will affect a wide range of areas, including parts of the west and south. It will also be affected, but now the west and south are not very affected because they were developed late and have vast land and sparsely populated areas.”
Facing the drought, East Africa was able to deal with it calmly and the entire national machine was running smoothly. However, the scope of this drought was a bit large, so it attracted great attention from the central government.
After more than ten years of development, black people have been virtually eliminated from eastern East Africa, and the population has reached the level of a normal country, which is obviously different from the sparsely populated countries such as Australia, Canada, and Argentina.
In fact, Brazil is quite vast and sparsely populated, but Brazil has a population of more than 10 million, so it makes sense, but East Africa is an exaggeration. In East Africa, the immigrant population in Tanganyika alone exceeds 10 million. This is not even Calculate the new population in East Africa.
So East Africa is no longer at the same level as the above-mentioned countries in terms of size. Of course, because of the rapid territorial expansion of East Africa, the population is still unbalanced with the land.
However, country populations are generally compared horizontally. The population of East Africa is already a stable and large country compared to most countries in the world.
As 1880 is approaching, the work of governments at all levels in East Africa has also intensified, because in Ernst's heart, 1880 is an important historical node, so in order to get a thorough understanding of the national conditions in East Africa, starting from September this year, the work that has been stagnant for several years has Census work has restarted.
For a country as large as East Africa in terms of population and territory, Ernst’s psychological expectation is that East Africa should develop better than Japan and Spain.
Although Japan is not yet a great power, it has developed rapidly through the Meiji Restoration, and Japan's first-mover advantage is much stronger than that of East Africa. The main problem is population. Japan is already a populous country, and the migration of East African people from other countries has cost a lot of money. Less time and money.
After all, value cannot be created without population. The East African colonies were almost in the same period as the Meiji Restoration. At that time, East Africa, which was a piece of white land, did not even have full control of Tanganyika.
So at that time, Japan could be said to have been at the front of the track, while East Africa had just started. Except for its land area, Japan was stronger than East Africa in all aspects at that time.
Looking at the development of the two countries more than ten years later, East Africa has made up for most of its shortcomings and has caught up with Japan in some areas.
Taking railways as an example, the railway mileage in East Africa was close to 10,000 kilometers in 1879, while that in Japan was only about 1,500 kilometers.
Lack of resources is also an important reason why Japan’s railway mileage is far less than that of East Africa. In order to build more than a thousand kilometers of railway, Ernst can think of the tight living conditions in Japan. In 1879, Japan was still an agricultural country, with more than 80% of its fiscal revenue relying on agricultural expenditures. The situation in East Africa was slightly better. There was the Hesingen Consortium out there attacking cities and territories. Of course, the Hessingen Consortium could not be considered pure. of East African assets.
In addition to agriculture, Japan's biggest bet is the textile industry, especially the silk industry. This is Japan's main export product. Finally, it is mainly about working abroad. Japanese people work all over the world and continuously support Japan's development. As for Japan's Mining is almost negligible.
In the final analysis, what Japan does is hard work, but Ernst admires this kind of spirit. To be honest, the living conditions of the Japanese are probably not comparable to those of black people in East Africa.
East Africa’s industrial focus is on emerging industries such as agriculture, industry, mining, and electricity. The development of agriculture in East Africa is different from Japan.
Japan has squeezed the value of land and farmers to the extreme, using the meager income from agriculture to support industrial and commercial development, so the investment in agriculture is far less than the value it extracts.
The investment in the development of agriculture in East Africa is quite high, and it is truly developed as a pillar industry. After all, such good land and environmental resources give East Africa reason to do so. Of course, Ernst also has some thoughts about agricultural hegemony in his heart, and he certainly cannot reflect it now. If you come out, you can at least get a share of the pie in the future.
Emerging industries such as electricity are still in their infancy in East Africa. Ernst has been paving the way for East Africa, mainly through education and talent introduction, which has not yet emerged.
Needless to say, there is no need to say much about industry and mining. East Africa follows the path of Germany and strongly supports heavy industry, which makes East Africa’s steel production exceed one million tons.
Of course, the biggest gap between the two countries is their military level. East Africa's defense strength has actually reached the level of the great powers. Especially after defeating Portugal, no country dares to underestimate East Africa's military strength.
Although Japan is relatively poor in its military strength, it cannot catch up with the military level of East Africa even though it sells iron and steel. The East African navy alone is something that Japan looks up to.
East Africa can be said to be far ahead of Japan except in terms of population. In fact, East Africa has the advantage in terms of population on both sides. After all, black lives matter. The 20 million black people in East Africa have made important contributions to the development of East Africa.
The reason why Ernst compared Japan to Japan was because of helplessness. There are few emerging countries in this era that can compare with the development of East Africa. East Africa has not reached the level of Germany and the United States. Italy, the last crane, has been torn apart because of Ernst. Other countries like Belgium and Romania are small and pitiful.
In terms of the countries closest to East Africa in terms of national strength, they should actually be the Ottomans and Spain. Ernst personally believes that the Ottoman military strength is stronger than that of Spain. After all, in the 10th Russo-Turkish War, the Ottoman performance was still very impressive. Spain was in the century At the end of the day, there were not many outstanding performances, but the geographical situation faced by the Ottoman Empire was much worse than that of Spain, but it did not affect the Ottoman's status as a great power.
Spain's strength is more reflected in its oceans and colonies, and its homeland is not bad either. It is quite average in Europe.
In addition to these countries, the ones in front of East Africa are nothing more than Britain, France, Russia, Germany and the United States plus a Far Eastern Empire. Ernst did not praise the Far Eastern Empire because of his identity as a Far Easterner in his previous life, but the Far Eastern Empire was indeed an extremely influential power in this era. , in addition to the above powers, the Far East Empire really has this strength.
It's just that the Far East Empire couldn't exert its own strength. The Qing government was timid for its own rule. On the one hand, it vigorously supported the development of military industry, but it did not dare to invest too much in the military. After all, the Qing government's Eight Banners system had become a waste. The Han people were strictly guarded against the Han people, and the foreign military was always hesitant. Naturally, they suffered repeated defeats. However, if you look closely, many wars were actually fought well in the early stages. However, once capable people took the lead, they would be restricted.
Hence, by comparing it with other countries in the world, Ernst believes that the national strength of East Africa should be right between the great powers and non-great powers. Without Italy, the goalkeeper position of the great powers would be Spain, and East Africa should be ranked below Spain.
(End of this chapter)