African Entrepreneurship Records 2

Chapter 1074 Market and Contradiction

During the entire Second Five-Year Plan period, East Africa's national industrial output value increased by 187%, while it only increased by 103% during the First Five-Year Plan. The performance was significantly higher than that of the First Five-Year Plan. Such high growth was closely related to the comprehensive outbreak of advantageous industries such as automobiles and electricity during the Second Five-Year Plan.

In particular, industries such as automobiles and tractors have a very obvious driving effect on East African industry and have become the flagship products of East African industrial exports.

Although East Africa was a strong country in automobiles, tractors and other machinery in the past, the scale of production and export was not large at that time. During the Second Five-Year Plan, due to the development of related industries in the United States and Europe, East Africa began to increase the scale of exports of large machinery such as automobiles and tractors.

At this time, the cost of American automobile manufacturers has been reduced to less than $1,000 per vehicle. Many automakers such as Ford and General Motors have developed rapidly, and the American automobile industry has begun to take shape.

Therefore, in order to cope with the competition from these emerging forces, East Africa has increased its dumping efforts in the international market, bringing "warmth" to the international automobile market.

The automobile industry alone had a huge impact on the national industry during East Africa's Second Five-Year Plan. Automobiles are high-value-added industrial products, which greatly increased East Africa's overall industrial output value and at the same time promoted the rapid development of related industries such as bearings, engines, rubber, steel, alloys, petroleum, chemicals, etc.

In the past, the automobile industry was Japan's largest industry, accounting for about 10% of Japan's GDP and as much as 40% of its manufacturing industry. In Germany, which is also a manufacturing powerhouse, the automobile industry accounts for more than 50% of its manufacturing industry and about 9% of its GDP.

The importance of the automobile industry to Japan and Germany in the past shows that the automobile industry has a strong driving ability for the economy and industry. Currently, East Africa is the world's largest automobile producer, and the automobile industry has a significant driving effect on the country's economy.

This was vividly reflected in East Africa's exports of industrial products during the Second Five-Year Plan. Although East Africa's exports of power equipment and products were already excellent in the 1990s, countries such as the United States and Germany were still competitive. During the two five-year plans, East Africa's automobile industry completely gained an overwhelming advantage over the two countries.

To be honest, the automobile industry is the main reason why East Africa's industrial growth rate during the Second Five-Year Plan was significantly higher than that during the First Five-Year Plan. Of course, East Africa's development in other aspects is also not bad.

Especially in the production of civilian industrial products, East Africa has seen a significant improvement compared with the past. During the Second Five-Year Plan, light industrial production has become a new growth point for East Africa's industrial growth. Although export performance is not satisfactory, it has met most of the needs of the domestic market.

"By the end of 1909, the scale of my country's industry was nearly three times that of 1900, with more than newly registered large, medium and small enterprises nationwide. During the Second Five-Year Plan, light industry increased significantly, heavy industry continued to maintain rapid development, and agriculture made steady progress."

During the two five-year plans alone, the number of East African enterprises exceeded the total number of East African construction enterprises in the entire 19th century, more than doubling. Although due to historical reasons, East Africa only had a place on the world stage for a few decades in the mid-to-late 19th century.

During the Second Five-Year Plan, East Africa's heavy industry development remained at the top of the list, with steel, electricity, railways, energy, mining and other heavy industries making great contributions, especially the chemical and automobile industries.

Compared with the First Five-Year Plan period, light industry has received more attention, but the gap with other industrial countries is still significant, and the reasons are still technology, market, production efficiency, etc.

Agriculture focuses on stable development. During the Second Five-Year Plan, the export growth of agricultural products in East Africa was not large, and international prices continued to be sluggish. However, due to the improvement of technology and mechanization, as well as the protection of East Africa's own market, the agricultural output value barely achieved positive growth.

However, the East African governments' investment in agriculture is also relatively high, so agricultural income has not met the psychological expectations of the East African governments.

However, this was also expected by the East African government. Long before East Africa decided to vigorously develop industry, the East African government understood that there was no "future" in relying on agricultural development.

Especially after entering the 20th century, East Africa's population has grown massively. In the world, East Africa is no longer an underdeveloped country. In the past few decades, East Africa's engineering volume is even greater than that of South America combined over the past hundred years. Now, in the entire sub-Saharan region, East Africa can compare industrial and agricultural data with any region in the world on its own.

"Among the world's major economies, East Africa's economic growth rate remains in the first tier in the world, with an annual economic growth rate exceeding that of the United States and Germany, and maintained at around 10%."

Since 1890, East Africa's economy has remained at a high level, followed by the United States and then Germany. Of course, although the growth rates of the United States and Germany are not as high as that of East Africa, their economic base is large, so their economic growth is greater than that of East Africa.

After entering 1900, economic crises frequently occurred in European and American countries, which further made East Africa's industrial growth rate stand out among the major powers. In particular, the US economy and industry even declined to a certain extent last year, but the United States quickly adjusted.

The German economy was also affected to a certain extent, but Germany temporarily slowed down the decline by investing in the military industry. However, this also allowed Germany to take a further step on the road of military expansion.

The industries in East Africa, the United States, and Germany have been growing the fastest in the past twenty years, while those in other countries will only get worse. However, the three countries are facing the same problem, which is the market. Apart from their own factors, the market is the main limitation for them to make further progress.

The industrial levels of countries such as Britain and France are obviously not in line with the international markets they occupy. This is also the contradiction between emerging industrial countries and traditional industrial countries.

Of course, the contradiction between France and Germany is the most prominent, not just because of market factors. At least for France, if it wants to go further on the European continent, it can only defeat Germany, its powerful enemy.

Apart from the colonial powers, East Africa, the United States and Germany, the international market share is quite unstable. Although the industrial development of these three countries has surpassed other countries, the market cannot be opened up simply by relying on the quality or cost advantages of their own industrial products.

For example, in the past, the trade between Britain and the Far Eastern Empire. Although the Far Eastern Empire’s industrial development was relatively backward, it was still able to surpass Britain in international trade relying solely on its strong traditional handicraft industry. In fact, the same was true for India before it was colonized by Britain. The Far Eastern Empire and India were the two most important centers in the world before the advent of the industrial age.

At that time, emerging countries such as Britain eventually defeated these traditional powers by relying on force to resolve the problem.

Judging from the development paths of countries such as Britain, France, East Africa, the United States and Germany, if they want to break the current international system and compete for the international market, they will ultimately have to resolve it through war.

It’s just that East Africa, like the United States, has much more options than Germany, so the main force to subvert the old world order still depends on Germany.

Large countries like East Africa and the United States have more resources to mobilize and more room for maneuver, and can deal with Britain or France, which have huge colonies. Germany does not have such conditions. Germany has a small land area, scarce resources for industrial development, and great pressure on population.

Therefore, Germany may still be able to take a gamble by choosing the war route, but if it chooses peaceful competition, Germany's chances of winning are the smallest because Germany has the fewest cards in its hand.

Of course, if Germany chooses the latter, it may not be completely without advantages. Now that German industry has developed, coupled with its demographic advantage, if it can economically penetrate European countries, Germany's national strength still has a lot of room for improvement, but it is ultimately limited. After all, Britain, France, Austria and Russia are all big countries, and other countries are not weak either, so this path is quite difficult to take.

(End of this chapter)