African Entrepreneurship Records 2

Chapter 1201 Economic System Advantages
Currently, 28% of East Africa's national electricity supply comes from hydropower, which is a very large proportion. After all, in the previous Far East Empire, hydropower accounted for less than 20%.

However, the development of East Africa's hydropower resources is not sufficient and there is still huge room for improvement. The reason why East Africa has developed such a large proportion of hydropower, in addition to its natural advantages, is also closely related to East Africa's national conditions.

After all, most areas of East Africa have water storage needs, because East Africa's climate is mainly tropical savannah, divided into rainy season and dry season. This means that East Africa is destined to build a large number of water conservancy projects to intercept the water in the rainy season and ensure water for industrial and agricultural use.

The construction of artificial reservoirs is naturally the top priority of water conservancy projects. Generally speaking, in order to improve utilization, most artificial reservoirs also have power generation functions, so the utilization rate of hydropower development in East Africa is relatively high.

Wang Hailong said: "Because of the existence of the Congo Basin, it is equivalent to holding a huge hydropower cornucopia for East Africa. If it can be fully developed, it can solve most of East Africa's electricity supply problems."

"However, compared with hydropower, thermal power still has an absolute advantage in East Africa's current power supply, accounting for about 70%. In addition, due to regional energy characteristics, different fuels are used as the basis for power generation. For example, southern East Africa uses coal, while some areas in the north use oil or natural gas. In addition to hydropower, the west also uses a large amount of oil as fuel for power plants."

"In 1910, the electricity penetration rate in East Africa reached an incredible percent, basically achieving electricity penetration in all towns and some rural areas. Even now, East Africa is the only country in the world with an electricity penetration rate of more than percent."

Thanks to East Africa's first two five-year plans, the East African power sector officially built the East African national power grid in a national sense during this period. And because of technological advances, East Africa already had independent intellectual property rights for hydropower and thermal power generation, achieving a new round of breakthroughs in power production technology.

If compared with the regions and countries where East Africa was located in the previous life, this data can be said to be quite outrageous. After all, the regions and countries where East Africa was located in the previous life, that is, those small African countries, can be said to be the regions with the lowest electricity penetration rate in the world. Even in the 21st century, many places still have no electricity.

And East Africa is indeed the world's largest electricity producer and consumer at this time and place, and its electricity penetration rate ranks first in the world.

Of course, the cost is also huge. East Africa has invested a lot of money, manpower and time. During the first two five-year plans in East Africa, the investment in infrastructure such as electricity was an astronomical figure, which is also an important reason why East Africa’s Third Five-Year Plan faces a lack of funds.

After all, East Africa was really happy when these infrastructures were being built, but the massive resources invested in a short period of time could not generate returns as quickly as light industry, and the cycle could easily take ten or even twenty years.

This is also a manifestation of spending money before it is earned, so this is also an important reason why East Africa was so eager to push for the outbreak of World War I.

Only with the outbreak of World War I could East Africa's production lines be rapidly rolled out, transforming these infrastructures into catalysts for production. At the same time, relying on the international market vacated during World War I, the construction achievements of East Africa's first two five-year plans were digested.

After listening to Wang Hailong's narration, General Zhang and his Far East Empire officials seemed silent. The gap was really too big.

"I have noticed that the street lights in Dar es Salaam are on almost all night long. Even at night, the whole city is as bright as day."

"Every household in Dar es Salaam has access to electricity, and many East African families have a considerable number of home appliances. Take the Oriental Hotel where we are, for example. It has electric lights, telephones, radios, phonographs, and so on. The development of Western countries is so terrible now!"

"Is this what they call electrification? We haven't even caught up with cars in the steam age, and now we are lagging far behind the Western society."

For the Far Eastern Empire, East Africa is a member of the Western countries through and through. After all, East Africa is geographically located to the west of the Far Eastern Empire. Of course, the East African government and most East African citizens have never thought so. East Africa's positioning of its own country is actually similar to the American concept of the New World, and it is not confused with Europe.

Although Africa does not belong to the New World, this is mainly due to North Africa's long-term participation in world history. After all, whether it is European or Arab civilization, they cannot avoid the North African region.

But the area south of the Sahara Desert and North Africa are like two different worlds. At least in Ernst's opinion, the civilization south of the Sahara Desert is not as developed as that of the American Indians.

So Wang Hailong said: "Don't worry too much about this. There are still some differences between East Africa and Western countries. At least from what I know, East Africa is very different from many Western countries."

"In addition to the fact that the economic development model is very different from that of Europe and the United States, many industrial fields in East Africa are very different from those in Europe and the United States. For example, the concept of electrification that I mentioned seems to be the only country in East Africa that has a grand strategy at the national level, and they have been planning since the 1970s."

"At that time, East Africa's technological level was far behind that of European and American countries. However, it was precisely because of its advantages in economic system that East Africa caught up and became a leader in some fields."

"Electricity and internal combustion engines are two typical examples. The development of electricity in East Africa originated in Germany. But now, although Germany is a leader in this area, it is inevitably left behind by East Africa."

It can actually be said that East Africa's power technology originated from the Hei Xingen Group. The Hei Xingen Group should be considered as one of the earliest capital groups involved in investment in the power sector and made important contributions to the early power construction in East Africa. Of course, Wang Hailong did not know much about this.

"The reason why East Africa has surpassed Germany is obviously that the advantages of East Africa's economic system have played a huge role. According to the propaganda of the East African government, it is to concentrate its efforts on major tasks. Through the full support of the government and the unified coordination of resource allocation, the scale of East Africa's power industry has expanded rapidly, and finally achieved the effect of breaking through the surface with a point, driving the development of other industries in the country."

Chief Zhang said: "Concentrate all efforts on major tasks. This is the true essence of East Africa's economic development. After all, East Africa has rapidly risen to become a powerful industrial country in just a few decades. There is indeed a reason for this."

East Africa, a powerful industrial country in the eyes of many countries, actually does not recognize this title. After all, according to the East African government's positioning of its own industry, East Africa is merely a semi-industrialized country.

Influenced by Ernst, East Africa's standards for industrialization have always been based on some of its own industrial indicators, the most important of which is the urbanization rate. However, the current urbanization rate in East Africa is obviously lower than the psychological expectations of the East African government. The urbanization rate in East Africa as a whole is only 33.6%.

This is the statistical data of the urbanization rate in East Africa in 1914. After all, it is now the end of 1915, and the East Africa Third Five-Year Plan is coming to an end, so the East African government has begun to collect some important data for its own country.

During the Third Five-Year Plan, the urbanization rate in East Africa has increased significantly, even exceeding the growth rate of the previous two Five-Year Plans. However, it is undeniable that compared with other industrial powers, the urbanization rate in East Africa is still relatively low, around 30%, which is higher than that of the three major powers: Russia, Spain and Japan.

In other words, East Africa's current urbanization rate ranks in the middle among the major powers, while the countries with the highest urbanization rates, Britain and Germany, are far ahead of East Africa. Even the United States and France are about ten percentage points higher than East Africa.

(End of this chapter)