African Entrepreneurship Records

Chapter 957 Agriculture, forestry, animal husbandry and fishery

After Helwein listened to Morse's opinions, he asked Morse to formulate Kampala's agricultural development strategy. This can be regarded as an excellent phenomenon in the governance of East African countries.

After all, most officials in East Africa do not have as much experience and family heritage as European aristocratic officials, which makes East African officials rely more on the advice of "experts". The only pity is that there are too few practical experts like Morse.

 …

 In Rhine City, Ernst was also listening to reports from professionals from the Ministry of Agriculture.

“As of 1898, the country’s cultivated land area was close to 2.5 billion acres, second only to Tsarist Russia and the United States in the world. In the past eight years, the new cultivated land was mainly in the central and western regions, as well as the southeastern region.”

"With the increase in cultivated land, farmland water conservancy facilities have also increased significantly. More than four million black workers have participated in agricultural production activities, and a large number of new water conservancy facilities and reservoirs have been built. In the past five years alone, the number of new reservoirs has reached more than 20,000. This has greatly increased Improved agricultural production efficiency.”

As a country dominated by savannah climate, rainfall distribution in most areas of East Africa is uneven, especially with large seasonal differences. The construction of water conservancy facilities has greatly improved the efficiency of agricultural production in East Africa.

In the absence of water conservancy facilities, the land in most areas of East Africa could only be cultivated once a year. However, after the construction of new reservoirs and other water conservancy facilities, water sources were guaranteed, and many lands in East Africa were able to be cultivated twice a year. In some areas, even It can be harvested three times a year.

 This is equivalent to doubling food production in East Africa without increasing the area of ​​cultivated land. This shows the outstanding achievements of agricultural water conservancy construction in East Africa.

“In the 1990s, our most important scientific and technological progress was the development and popularization of large vehicles and agricultural machinery. In 1898, the number of tractors nationwide reached more than 14,000, with the highest penetration rate in the Great Lakes and central regions.”

East Africa's tractor production technology has been relatively complete. At the same time, as a key science and technology project in East Africa, it mainly gives priority to meeting domestic demand. Currently, East Africa is also the country with the most cars, tractors and other internal combustion engine vehicles in the world.

 The secret to East Africa’s production advantages of agricultural machinery such as automobiles and tractors is assembly line production. Of course, on this basis, Ernst also proposed the concept of the entire industry chain.

 The division of labor among various factories in East Africa is clear and cooperative development has a huge impact on the industrial production capacity of East Africa. Take the automobile assembly plant in New Frankfurt as an example. Many of its internal parts are not produced by the factory but are provided by other factories.

Of course, the overall management and formulation of unified standards by the East African government has greatly improved the reliability of parts and components.

 These factories are basically located in the central and inland areas due to the need for confidentiality, and European and American standards are adopted along the coast. As a result, the automobile production plants in Dar es Salaam and Mombasa still use the traditional manual assembly model, which is extremely inefficient.

Of course, East African assembly line models will also be exported in conjunction with the cars produced in these manual factories. The former are generally high-end models, while the latter are low-end models.

 After all, assembly line models produce more parts, are more uniform in quality, and are easier to maintain and repair, so they are labeled as “high-end products.”

 However, in addition to industry, the main sources of income in the two places include commerce and service industries, which are not available in inland cities in East Africa.

"The past thirty years have also been a period of great development of our country's forestry resources. The continuous expansion of the country has led to the continuous expansion of the forest area we have obtained, especially the almost inexhaustible forestry resources in the Congo Basin. As for artificial forests, , mainly rubber forests.”

Before East Africa, the African continent had not been effectively developed for a long time, so it accumulated a huge amount of forestry resources, including a large number of virgin forests in arid Southwest Africa and Somalia. Therefore, at the current stage, the area of ​​deforestation in East Africa is far greater than that of planting. area. And this situation will continue. The area of ​​cities and cultivated land is still on the rise, so the plunder of forests will also be a long-term process.

“The livestock industry in East Africa is developing rapidly, especially in high-quality grasslands such as South Africa and Southwest Africa. The main economy in Southwest Africa is livestock industry. At the same time, the development of livestock industry in the western region has also created a certain competitive relationship between us and Argentine agriculture.”

Argentina is a big country in animal husbandry. In the 19th century, it could even be said to be a strong country in animal husbandry. Although Southwest Africa is arid, it also means that there is a large amount of grassland there. In addition, the vast land and sparse population are naturally conducive to the development of large pastures. At the same time, with the The construction of the Walvis Bay Railway and Alexandria Port provided access to the sea for agricultural and animal husbandry products in Southwest Africa.

The livestock market mainly targets European countries, which has depressed international beef prices to a certain extent. Of course, the development of livestock industry in Southwest Africa started late, so the current influence is also weak.

"As for fishery resources, they are also in a stage of rapid development, especially the existence of fisheries on the west coast, which has given us a stable source of marine fishery resources in East Africa. In the past eight years, the marine fishing industry in East Africa has quadrupled. With ships , the development of railway and cold food technology not only provides domestic residents with a new source of meat, but also brings huge profits through export to European and American countries. "

The west coast fishery in East Africa is the fifth largest fishery in the world, and it is also the only fishery among the five largest fisheries in the world that has not undergone large-scale development.

At the same time, on the east coast of East Africa, due to the existence of the Somali Ocean Current, seasonal fishing grounds will be formed, and East Africa is not a politically unstable country like Somalia in the previous life, so East Africa basically has a firm grasp on the resource development rights of the fishing grounds along the Somali coast.

　　Due to the civil war in Somalia in the previous life, the government and local warlords were corrupt and incompetent, and were unable to effectively manage the Somali coast. Therefore, the entire Somali coast became a paradise for foreign fishing boats.

The small sampans of Somali fishermen are naturally unable to compare with the advanced and professional foreign fishing boats. Therefore, foreign fishing boats have been fishing off the coast of Somalia, causing the local fishery resources to be depleted and the fishermen to lose their source of income, thus giving rise to the profession of "pirates" in Somalia.

It is true that the original small fishing boats are not good at fishing, but after being equipped with engines and robbing passing merchant ships, they can achieve a class leap. Therefore, the problem of Somali piracy is also a reincarnation of cause and effect.

Of course, although the fisheries off the coast of Somalia are rich in resources, they cannot be compared with the fisheries on the west coast. Although East Africa acquired the west coast in a short time, judging from the time when the East African government vigorously supported the development of the marine fishing industry, the two were carried out almost at the same time, so The growth rate of the marine fishing industry on the West Coast is much faster than that on the East Coast.

“The above is basically the basic development situation of my country’s four major industries of agriculture, forestry, animal husbandry and fishery. Generally speaking, East African agriculture is in a period of rapid and stable development.”

“The driving force behind this rapid development is mainly the promotion of government policies, the increase in the national population, the development of the transportation industry, etc.”

 In terms of policy, the whole country is in a chess game, and the role of the East African government cannot be ignored. Population growth is the driving force for agricultural investment and expansion in East Africa. The development of transportation is also extremely important, especially playing a key role in the development and utilization of fishery resources.

If the transportation conditions in the west are not in place, it is naturally impossible for East Africa to vigorously develop the western marine fishing industry unless it is processed into shelf-stable cans or semi-finished products in cities and factories on the west coast.

The application of refrigeration technology on railways has made it possible to eat relatively fresh seafood products in the interior of East Africa, which has expanded the market scope of the marine fishing industry.

 In fact, it was only after the East African railway network was basically formed that the East African marine fishing industry entered a stage of rapid development.

 (End of this chapter)