African Entrepreneurship Record

New Frankfurt City.

As an emerging city, New Frankfurt City’s industrial level is continuously rising. During the First Five-Year Plan, many quality projects landed in the region, especially in the textile, equipment manufacturing, automobile manufacturing, and electronics industries, which are thriving.

New Frankfurt City’s regional advantage is mainly reflected in the transportation sector, as it is one of the most important land transportation hubs in East Africa, with waterways, railways, and highways densely intersecting here, extending like octopus tentacles across the entire nation.

A section of the East African Grand Canal passes through the New Frankfurt City area, connecting the Congo River basin with the Zambezi River basin water systems. Of course, it does not run through the city center but passes through its subordinate jurisdiction range.

This canal has already achieved connectivity between the copper belt and southern cities, and navigation on certain tributaries of the Congo River and Zambezi River, stretching over 180 kilometers in length. Such insane engineering feats are not unusual in recent years in East Africa, with numerous Black people falling under the terror of its massive infrastructure scale.

The artificial canal takes advantage of the Katanga Plateau’s terrain, flowing from the Northeast to the Southwest, mainly sourcing its water from the rain-rich Congo River basin, enhancing navigational capacity and serving as a water transfer project to effectively supplement the Zambezi River basin.

Its main source comes from the tributaries of the upper Congo River’s Luapula River, resulting in abundant water volume. The canal line is accompanied by an irrigation ditch system for farmland, which plays a significant role in stabilizing grain production around Rhein City.

After all, the annual rainfall around Rhein City already exceeds 800 millimeters, and through the water transfer project, it can basically ensure the water safety issues near the capital region and throughout the Central Province.

The Central Province is located in the transitional zone between tropical savanna and rainforest climate, so the further north you go, the more stable the precipitation becomes, making the Central Province section of the East Africa Grand Canal very important.

Though the canal passes through the New Frankfurt City area, it is still some distance from the city center, yet New Frankfurt City’s future urban development will inevitably lean towards the canal section direction.

Several key enterprises, especially New Frankfurt City’s textile and chemical industries, which are high-water consumption industries, are gathering in this area, with New Frankfurt City’s artificial fiber plant is located in the Central Province canal section.

This plant was a focus enterprise during the First Five-Year Plan, officially constructed in March last year, and now the plant has begun production.

The scale of the New Frankfurt City artificial fiber plant is not large, only considered a medium-sized enterprise, but it is highly valued by the government. Ernst specifically visited to inspect East Africa’s first artificial fiber plant.

Faced with the Crown Prince, the employees and management of the New Frankfurt City artificial fiber plant were naturally very nervous because artificial fibers have been a focal point of Ernst’s attention from the start, and today he is here to verify the results.

”Your Highness, this artificial fiber technology was introduced from Germany’s J.P. Bemberg company and first appeared in the early 90s.”

”At that time, German scientists Brenne and Freyme created copper-ammonium artificial fibers by dissolving cellulose in copper-ammonium solutions, obtaining the invention’s patent.”

”Later, in the late 90s, J.P. Bemberg company successfully applied this new manufacturing method of copper-ammonium fibers to industrial production, and through collaboration with Germany, the government obtained the relevant technology and finally established the industry in New Frankfurt City.”

This was the copper-ammonium thread of the previous era, but Ernst is not very familiar with it, as the development of artificial fibers or chemical fibers worldwide has only just begun.

In 1884, the famous French chemist Chardonnet immersed nitrocellulose in alcohol and ether to produce long and beautiful artificial silk, and in 1891 began mass production.

In 1891, British scientists Cruise and Bevin decomposed cellulose with strong alkali and carbon disulfide, then used centrifugal force in a spinning box to produce viscose rayon through dehydration spinning.

This safe and inexpensive artificial fiber method quickly became popular and is the most widely used method of producing artificial fibers.

From the timeline, chemical fiber beginnings aren’t any earlier than the 80s, with rapid developments beginning in the 90s, as new technologies continually emerge. The copper-ammonium fiber technology that East Africa introduced is a product of the 90s.

Therefore, the development of East African chemical fiber was not delayed, and the New Frankfurt City chemical fiber plant is one important symbol of this.

This technology introduction extends to Bulawayo City, Mogadishu City, Nairobi City, and Jezira City, among other key textile cities.

The textile industry in New Frankfurt City is also quite developed; it is one of the important inland cotton distribution centers, while the copper-ammonium thread technology coincides with regions where East Africa’s cotton textile industry thrives.

This is significantly related to the required raw materials, with copper-ammonium thread’s primary raw material being upland cotton, cotton seed hairs processed via special techniques from which fibers are extracted.

Thus, copper-ammonium fiber is a type of regenerated cellulose fiber derived by dissolving natural cellulose raw materials like cotton linter in copper hydroxide or basic copper salt concentrated ammonia solution, forming a spinning solution. In a coagulation bath, copper cellulose molecules chemically decompose and regenerate cellulose, resulting in hydrated cellulose that, upon post-processing, becomes copper ammonium fiber.

And copper-ammonium thread, as its name implies, resembles ”silk” more, with fibers having a circular cross-section, without a skin-core structure, capable of withstanding high tension, producing finer single threads. Therefore, the fabric made from copper-ammonium thread feels soft with a gentle sheen, offering a silk-like feel.

Apart from cotton linter, the indispensable component for copper-ammonium thread is copper ammonium solution, and East Africa is an important copper-producing nation, with ammonia production already underway, so neither is lacking.

Therefore, New Frankfurt City started producing copper ammonium thread fibers on the basis of its textile and chemical industry foundations, utilizing ammonia production.

”With the help of German experts, we have thoroughly mastered this technology and can now produce it on a large scale.”

Then, under the guidance of the technical staff and management, Ernst visited the entire production process of copper-ammonium thread, everything proceeded smoothly, and Ernst personally experienced the final product’s texture.

Ernst nodded and said, ”The quality is acceptable, at least the feel is somewhat similar to ordinary silk, it seems you have indeed grasped the technology.”

The factory director said: ”Your Highness, apart from the help from the Germans, the main advantage for mastering this technology was our own talent, they managed to grasp it thoroughly within days, unlike someone like me who doesn’t have the university students’ sharp minds.”

East African university students with high education and some chemical knowledge naturally hold advantages over ordinary people, and with the Germans’ assistance, it would be embarrassing if they couldn’t learn it.

Since this was not new technology matured internally, East Africa has certainly trained numerous chemical talents in recent years, but producing results will require some time.

After all, East Africa mainly learns from Europe and America countries, and the chemical fiber industries in Europe and America are just starting, for East Africa to quickly catch up has met Ernst’s expectations.

Chemical industry is undoubtedly among the emerging industries of this era, and Germany is an outstanding player, providing convenience for East Africa’s chemical industry development. With close relations between East Africa and Germany, it would be much more difficult if Americans and British people held the industry’s discourse power.

Of course, gaining emerging tech from other countries would be advantageous for East Africa, though East Africa already has numerous chemistry talents, and given time, will surely carve out a niche in this field in the future.