African Entrepreneurship Record

Chapter 181: Chapter 170: Expansion and Immigration Issues

At present, East Africa’s development is extremely rapid, although now is the era of industrialization, East Africa’s development in industrialization is almost blank.

However, the conditions in East Africa are not very favorable in themselves, especially before the colonial development of East Africa when the vast majority of the area was still in the primitive hunting civilization.

The vast land had not been developed or utilized, and the only modern state entity, the Sultanate of Zanzibar, relied heavily on the slave trade on the mainland.

Bringing the East African colonies into an agricultural society was already quite an achievement.

Agriculture is fundamental to East Africa; even in past lives, East Africa has been one of the few agricultural areas in Africa, capable of reaching a self-sufficient level. Tanzania and countries near the Great Lakes Region are important agricultural nations in Africa.

Of course, compared to being an agricultural country, East African countries would certainly prefer to be resource-rich countries. However, in previous developments, East Africa was relatively economically lagged compared to other African regions.

This is because East Africa’s resource endowment is not prominent across Africa. Of course, there are some benefits; in previous lives, East Africa had relatively fewer conflicts and wars compared to other regions in Africa, and society was generally more stable.

Of course, not being prominent does not mean a lack of resources, but East Africa lacks the main mineral resources for industrialization, such as coal, iron, and petroleum. These are in high demand and widely used and are the foundation of industrialization.

Take, for example, Africa’s world-famous and highest-yielding diamond resources from previous lives; these luxurious items had almost no substantial aid to Africa’s industrialization, and their profits were reaped by Western capital.

As for coal and iron resources, generally speaking, compared to other continents, Africa’s reserves are relatively small, but petroleum resources are relatively good, mainly distributed along the coasts of North and West Africa.

Africa is perceived as resource-rich mainly because of its low development level and resource utilization rates, and mining is the pillar industry of many countries.

Moreover, with technological advances, especially after the 21st century, the demand for non-ferrous metals, including heavy metals (copper, lead, zinc), light metals (aluminum, magnesium), precious metals (gold, silver, platinum), and rare metals (tungsten, molybdenum, germanium, lithium, lanthanum, uranium) grew rapidly, especially in the research and development of rare metals, and these resources are relatively abundant in Africa.

However, in terms of importance, the status of petroleum, coal, iron, copper, aluminum, gold, etc., is unshakable.

Especially energy, so many wars are energy wars, with many countries fighting fiercely over energy.

Regarding petroleum resources, East Africa can forget about it, as looking around there is only a considerable reserve in South Sudan, but currently, Ernst does not plan to engage in conflict with Egypt, and any nation with some strength deserves respect.

Efforts can be put into coal; East Africa has limited coal reserves, but there is abundant coal mining in the southern parts of Africa, especially in Zambia and Zimbabwe, which are currently ”unclaimed” territories.

Moreover, Ernst has long set his sights on Zambia, constantly longing for the copper mines on the Katanga Plateau (Central African Copperbelt).

This is the world’s most readily accessible major metal mining belt for East Africa, which can directly influence global copper pricing power.

With the securement of the Northwest of the Great Lake and northern Kenya, the main direction for colonial expansion in East Africa in 1869 will definitely be the Katanga Plateau.

This time, East Africa will maintain the previous expansion strategy to avoid conflicts of interest with regional powers and other colonizers, steering clear of their core interest areas, particularly those of Egypt, Britain, and Portugal.

Currently, there is a wide buffer zone between East Africa and the aforementioned countries or their colonies, preventing direct contact between the forces on both sides.

To the south is the Portuguese colony of Mozambique, and to the north are the Egyptian and British Somaliland colonies. East Africa and these powers are separated by terrain or indigenous peoples.

This determines that East Africa’s next phase of expansion can only head west, and due west is the Congo, but Ernst has little interest in tropical rainforests, and there is not much to attract East African expansion in the northwest direction.

Thus, only the southwest region remains, starting with capturing the Katanga Plateau, and preparing for future expansion of energy reserves (coal).

The above represents the current resource situation of the East African colonies, the surrounding environment, and the expansion plans for 1869.

In 1869, East Africa’s immigration goal is to surpass a population of two million. Indeed, Ernst’s current requirement is this low, as East Africa’s population is currently over 1.75 million, making exceeding two million quite easy, and may be achieved by the new population alone.

Two million is a threshold; surpassing this threshold means Ernst will no longer need to be as worried as before about security issues in East Africa.

The next step for East African immigration work is to proceed as usual, and there might not be much fluctuation in the future; the newly added ships and capacity of the Heixinggen Consortium will be directed toward industrial transfer and goods transportation rather than immigration.

This change also means that the selection criteria for immigrants to East Africa will rise rather than decrease. Previously, when there was an urgent need for immigrants, the standards inevitably declined in practice. Now, on the contrary, the requirements for immigrants will increase.

Of course, the growth rate of East African immigrants is not expected to change significantly. Since the latter half of 1868, East Africa has entered a stage of slow immigrant inflow.

Political stability and tranquility in the Far East and German regions have greatly diminished civilians’ willingness to venture out to sea. Coupled with East Africa’s past intense efforts, the immigration potential of these two areas has been exhausted and requires time to recover.

Therefore, East Africa currently has surplus immigration capacity. Fortunately, the newly introduced Slavic people filled some gaps, but overall, the immigration pace has slowed.

Of course, East Africa still welcomes immigrants from the German region, but there is none left at all. In the context of reduced German immigration, Ernst intends to limit the entry of other immigrants into East Africa.

German immigrants need to maintain at least a thirty percent level, European immigrants should remain at a twenty percent standard, the Far East around thirty percent, and other regions (such as the Middle East, Southeast Asia, and America) at twenty percent.

In this way, while there are many Chinese immigrants, there are more Europeans and other immigrants, with Germans being the majority among Europeans. Additionally, with intermarriages between immigrants within various regions of the East African colony, this population structure is relatively stable. Going forward, just continuing to implement German cultural integration is sufficient.

This is also a crucial reason Ernst no longer pursues immigration numbers. Every batch of immigrants must contain a certain number of German immigrants for balance, and now that German immigration has decreased, it means reducing the numbers of other immigrants or introducing new immigrant sources to prevent any single region’s immigrants from becoming excessively dominant, apart from German immigrants.

As a German, Ernst must ensure German cultural and ideological dominance in East Africa, especially during the early colonial period.

Moreover, Ernst now needs to prepare for the Franco-Prussian War. The Franco-Prussian War is an important opportunity for Ernst to seize to elevate the Heixinggen Consortium even further. Additionally, the opening of the Suez Canal is also this year, which will have profound impacts on East Africa, and Ernst will certainly need to make some adjustments to the East African colonies. Hence, the immigration issue this year will no longer be of such significance.