African Entrepreneurship Record

Chapter 243: Chapter 232 Another Water Chapter (Do Not Subscribe)

The state is a tool for class domination, and any state follows the same path. Immigrants to East Africa are merely exchanging one place of domination for another.

In Germany and the Far East, the vast majority of people are landless, with land owned by the Junker and landlord classes. It’s like people migrating to America during this era; if they’re not nobles or wealthy, they have to work as laborers for a few years.

The difference in East Africa is that below the populace, there are slaves. I might not be living well, but as long as there’s someone worse off than me, then I’m doing alright.

Initially, Ernst thought of distributing land to immigrants, but now it seems unnecessary since the immigrants have no such demands. They are used to being tenant farmers under nobles and landlords, and suddenly encountering East Africa, which takes care of food, clothing, shelter, and even marriage issues, actually makes them content. After all, they can’t imagine a better life.

Ernst initially also considered granting land for military merits, but the indigenous combat capability is not worth this price, so the land just remains in the hands of the Heixinggen royal family.

Furthermore, East Africa belongs to a unified family and state, and the Heixinggen royal family owns the entire region, turning East Africa’s politics into a patchwork monster.

The agricultural situation appears to resemble Soviet collective farms, except that legally, collective farms belong to the collective economy, owned jointly by villagers. In contrast, East Africa practices private ownership, yet almost all industries are private assets of the Heixinggen royal family.

Unlike American large-scale farmers, who focus on efficiency and profitability, East Africa operates entirely on planning, paying little heed to efficiency, resulting in per capita productivity not being fully harnessed. Given East Africa’s agricultural conditions of two-year five-crop cycles and the scale of land, it should surpass Italy, but in reality, it does not.

Immigrants in East Africa have been raised to some laziness by Ernst, and the reason this system hasn’t collapsed is still due to the existence of a slave economy.

As for the issue of whether grain sales would result in losses, it’s unnecessary worry; there will always be places in the world lacking food, like Japan, where the land-people contradiction is extremely prominent, with many dispossessed farmers, making Japan a major importer of East African rice. It’s not that East Africa has any special tricks; it’s just that Japan in this era is too poor and can only buy cheap rice from East Africa. Additionally, East Africa imports ”women,” cultural relics, and ancient books from Japan through grain trade, achieving mutual benefit.

Italy faces a similar fate, with East African flour produced by factories in Trieste known for poor quality, and Italy being the largest importer. East Africa uses this opportunity to import family immigrants from southern Italy.

Now, only Ireland, a country with a large immigrant population, has not been targeted by Ernst. It’s not that Ireland is looked down upon; rather, the British authorities do not treat them well, even prohibiting Germans from entering Ireland, using the excuse that the situation in Ireland is not good, and they fear foreign powers causing trouble, wondering if they’re spies for the French.

Another reason is that Ireland’s immigration wave passed years ago, around the 1850s, with about 1.8 million leaving Ireland. The previous Great Famine resulted in a quarter of the population dying off, and now Ireland is just a bit poor and a bit dissatisfied with Britain, with no reason to move far away.

Since immigrants can’t be gained from there, Ernst is instead more at ease with the current scale of immigration because, in the first five months of this year alone, the population born in East Africa reached an astonishing 380,000. If nothing unexpected happens, East Africa will easily see over 600,000 new births in 1870 alone, plus immigrant populations, easily breaking the million mark.

New immigrants will soon join the reproduction force, conservatively cycling every three years, and in ten years, East Africa’s population may surpass 10 million.

Currently, immigration stabilizes at 400,000 per year, making it 4 million in ten years, though it’s unlikely to remain stable since a years-long global economic crisis is on the horizon. At that time, there will surely be a surge in the population migrating to East Africa.

Regarding the population issue, Ernst is calmly in control and should focus on other East African industries.

Land ownership is a headache for Ernst, and he understands clearly that the Heixinggen royal family cannot always agree with these cunning people. With time, the land will eventually have to be released.

However, the question of when and how to release the land must be carefully considered to avoid chaos.

Now, some mines can be put forth to attract Austrian investment, as designed before the establishment of the Kingdom of East Africa.

By using East Africa’s mineral resources to support Austrian industrial development, East Africa can complete its economic binding with Austria. When conflicts arise between East Africa and Anglo-French powers, the Austrian government will be most anxious.

Though the Suez Canal is in Anglo-French hands, Austria is probably the biggest beneficiary. With four million square kilometers in East Africa, it simultaneously solves Austria’s food and industrial raw material problems; the only flaw is that East Africa’s market is not open to Austria, and tropical grain quality is poor, avoiding direct competition with Hungary. Even the raw materials for Ernst’s Vienna factory come from the Hungarian region, aiming at mid-to-high food markets.

The East African market is negligible, with almost no consumer power among the populace, and their wages essentially consist of bonds issued by Heixinggen Bank, which are unrecognized outside East Africa.

The only real gain Austria can obtain from East Africa lies in government procurement of weapons and equipment, such as large-caliber coastal defense guns and gunboats.

Sole reliance on royal investment leads to too slow a development, and it can also divert some immigrants into the industrial sector.

Additionally, there is the military challenge, as East African forces are insufficient. With four million square kilometers, the military must at least exceed 100,000, and suppressing slaves also demands a massive number of troops.

With the development of the agricultural slave economy, agriculture will not require as many people in the future. Once enough money is accumulated, and Heixinggen Energy Power Company’s tractors are approximately developed, slaves can still be used temporarily, but they are destined not to stay.

Cooperation with Austria is East Africa’s national policy because East Africa’s education, research, military industry, and other sectors need Austrian support.

Right now, these cannot be implemented in East Africa. For example, in education, relying on East Africa’s own educational development, at least two more years are needed for the first batch of East African students just to reach the second grade. Even overseas students are mostly children, who must continue elementary and secondary education abroad before accessing higher education.

With higher education undeveloped, research and military industries naturally cannot be achieved, not to mention the lack of personnel even for slightly technical industries.

Nevertheless, Ernst is unconcerned. East Africa has only been developing for three years, so there’s no point pondering these unrealistic issues.

Moreover, East Africa established a foundational compulsory education system from the outset, which will inevitably develop as the second generation of East Africans matures; it’s merely a matter of time. Many countries worldwide don’t even have compulsory education, so the initiation of the education enterprise in East Africa isn’t considered late.