African Entrepreneurship Record

Chapter 1055: Chapter 64: Industry Feeds Agriculture

East Africa’s agricultural development has been slow, but now it has truly bridged the gap with Europe and America. Although the production of pesticides and fertilizers doesn’t match that of Germany, it doesn’t differ much from other countries in quantity. Of course, when it comes to per capita, that’s a different story.

After all, the national situations of Germany and East Africa are different; East Africa, Tsarist Russia, and the United States have large land areas with ample land resources, while Britain and France have vast overseas colonies that can relieve the pressure on domestic agricultural development.

Under such circumstances, Germany’s progress in agricultural technology at this stage can be said to be unrivaled globally. Just looking at potato production, at the beginning of Germany’s unification, grain production was over seventeen million tons, and now it’s over twenty-five million tons, with potato production rising from over twenty million tons to over forty million tons, and beet production increasing from over twenty million tons to over thirty million tons.

This is obviously due to Germany’s concentrated outbreak in the fields of agricultural breeding, fertilizers, pesticides, and farm machinery. The ruling class is mainly the Junker aristocracy, who, as landlords themselves, attach great importance to the progress of agricultural technology.

Currently, based on purely agricultural yield comparison, Germany ranks first in the world, with unit yield far superior to the more fertile lands of France, and nearly double that of the United States and East Africa, more than twice that of Tsarist Russia.

Take the unit yield of potatoes, for instance; Germany’s potato yield per hectare is about one hundred fifty centners, with Tsarist Russia trailing at second with only over eighty centners, while France, the United States, and East Africa are around seventy centners.

Of course, Tsarist Russia’s climate is indeed suitable for potato production, which allows it to surpass France, the United States, and East Africa. However, when comparing the unit yield of grain, Tsarist Russia falls far behind other countries. Even East Africa’s wheat per hectare is around ten centners, whereas Russia is only at six to seven centners, the United States at over ten centners, and France is twice that of Russia; Germany is more than three times that of Tsarist Russia.

Among these countries, East Africa’s climate is the least suitable for wheat production, but thanks to advancements in agricultural technology, it still surpasses Russia. As for the crop position, wheat is no longer as prominent as rice is in East African grains, with East Africa’s rice production being even higher.

In terms of average land quality, Germany is only slightly better than East Africa, while France’s natural agricultural conditions are unparalleled in Western Europe, especially the land surrounding Paris. Tsarist Russia has Ukraine as a major granary, and the United States, with its rich variety of climates and high land fertility, needs no further explanation.

Hence, Germany, with not the most superior lands, surpasses other countries around the world in terms of grain yield per mu, the fundamental reason being its possession of the world’s most advanced agricultural technology.

This is greatly related to Germany’s industrial development. Take important agricultural fertilizers like potash, for instance, in the 90s, Germany’s potash production exceeded several million tons, with at least thirty percent of Germany’s grain cultivation costs invested in grain planting.

The same is true in the field of agricultural machinery. Although East Africa has gained a first-mover advantage in tractors, agricultural machinery is not only about tractors. Germany leads the world in threshers, seeders, mowers, steam plows, etc.

Even small-scale farms in Germany are equipped with at least ten kinds of production machinery. Moreover, with medium and large farms under Junker aristocrats being the mainstay, it can be said that in this era, Germany’s agriculture is the global benchmark.

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Rhein City.

Regarding agricultural mechanization, the East African Government certainly isn’t without significant actions. However, due to constraints like national arable land area and industrial strength, East Africa’s agricultural transition speed isn’t particularly fast.

The Minister of Agriculture was briefing Ernst on the current situation in East Africa’s agricultural sector when Minister Fen Ge’er said, ”Currently, our grain agricultural machinery technology accumulation is on par with other countries, but promoting these agricultural machines requires more effort.”

”Take wheat seeders, for example; we’ve replicated the seeders from Germany and other countries to achieve self-production of such machines, but our industrial capacity can’t compare with other industrial powers.”

”Take Germany, for instance; their industry surpasses ours, hence their seeder production exceeds ours, yet their arable land area is much smaller than ours. Simply put, even if we produce the same number of seeders as Germany, we wouldn’t achieve nationwide seeder coverage; we would need to produce over three times more wheat seeders than Germany to reach similar outcomes.”

”Moreover, wheat’s share in our crop planting has already declined, with rice occupying the first place in grain planting. Spreading our national-developed rice transplanters will be even more challenging than spreading wheat seeders.”

”Of course, currently, the government is making substantial efforts to promote comprehensive agricultural mechanization, but the establishment of related factories isn’t something that can be accomplished overnight, especially considering Germany had more groundwork when it unified.”

”However, we do have unparalleled advantages over other countries in tractors and automobiles, allowing our agricultural mechanization level to rapidly rise. Apart from Britain, France, Germany, and the United States, East Africa’s agricultural mechanization level is among the advanced globally.”

Tractors have a significant impact on promoting East African agriculture. In agriculture, tractors are versatile players that, through various modifications, can participate in almost all farming tasks, such as plowing, planting, harvesting, etc., which can all be carried out using tractors.

Using tractors as carriers and equipped with suitable farming tools allows them to perform many specialized agricultural machinery tasks. So, while East Africa’s comprehensive farm machinery research ability temporarily can’t compare with other industrial powers, its utilization efficiency has greatly improved, which is commonly known as ”Putting good steel to the edge.”

At the beginning of the 20th century, tractors in various countries were at their peak steam era, and American steam tractor annual production exceeded ten thousand units, whereas East Africa, through the first Five-Year Plan, internal combustion tractor annual production already reached seventy thousand units.

Due to various limitations, steam tractors’ efficiency naturally couldn’t compare with internal combustion tractors, so although East Africa seemed less colorful compared to other countries regarding comprehensive farm machinery development, it effectively closed its industrial gap since choosing the right track.

Additionally, East Africa’s advantage in agricultural machinery research will grow with time. While other countries were still focusing on steam tractors, East Africa had already begun extending to other agricultural machinery using internal combustion tractors as carriers. A non-agricultural example, the most typical one, is that East Africa’s armored vehicle production mainly takes place at tractor factories.

Ernst: ”During the first and second Five-Year Plans, industrial development is the national focus, which is a factor restricting the speed of agricultural mechanization; after all, industrial profits are greater, the larger the industrial scale, the higher the government profits, and it’s not easy to increase agricultural increments; no matter how hard one tries, land productivity can’t increase greatly, even with more fertilizers and pesticides involved, agriculture won’t skyrocket.”

”Of course, agricultural mechanization is the inevitable trend for future agricultural development. Under this premise, the faster the industrial development, the faster the agricultural mechanization, and the improvement in industrial capability means being able to produce more and better agricultural tools, thereby achieving industrial support for agriculture.”

In other words, in the current East African development stage, agriculture’s fundamental status as a nation won’t change, but agricultural development can’t surpass industrial development speed. Even during the second Five-Year Plan, if East Africa values agriculture more than during the first Five-Year Plan, it can’t put too much energy into it.

As industrial development progresses, agricultural mechanization will naturally follow. In fact, East Africa’s industrial support for agriculture has long begun, just because East Africa’s level of industrialization was relatively low, the effect hasn’t been apparent quickly.

Besides, agricultural development doesn’t rely solely on mechanization; it also depends on advancements in technologies such as pesticides and fertilizers. Although East Africa’s chemical industry through the first Five-Year Plan has become initial-scale, truly impacting agriculture significantly depends on the chemical industry’s development during the second Five-Year Plan.