African Entrepreneurship Record

April 11, 1904.

Pontianak Port.

Before the Russian Second Pacific Fleet left, a fleet arrived at Pontianak Port, and this fleet was the East African immigrant fleet.

As the fleet sailed along the river to Pontianak Port, the immigrants on the ship began to get familiar with this strange land for the first time.

"Pontianak looks good, with a wide river and fast currents, but the environment is a little uncomfortable. The forests on both sides of the river are dense and lush, which is very different from the mainland."

Although East Africa also has a tropical rainforest climate, the main population is still distributed in savannas or sub-rainforest areas, so after East African immigrants arrived in Pontianak, it was also the first time they saw the typical tropical rainforest climate type and vegetation.

"The equator passes through Pontianak, and Pontianak is located on the coastal plain of Kalimantan Island, so the tropical rainforest climate here is very typical, which also dooms Pontianak to be difficult to develop. Fortunately, the history of foreign civilization here is slightly longer than that of Africa, so it is not necessary to start from scratch."

In fact, it is difficult to define civilization. Just like the indigenous people of Africa, you say there is no civilization, they also have their own language, and at the same time, in addition to the development of tribes and slave kingdoms, but the level of civilization is too low, resulting in the entire southern Africa being almost the same as undeveloped.

So East Africa can develop and build its domestic development, which in a sense is really starting from scratch, and has achieved amazing results.

There is no doubt that the fundamental reason why East Africa can achieve amazing results is that the East African colonists brought advanced agricultural civilization, and now it is slowly transitioning to industrial civilization.

Although the overseas province of Lan Fang is also relatively backward, after more than a dozen generations of Chinese immigrants, the level of civilization has also reached the level of agricultural civilization.

However, under the governance of East Africa, the Lan Fang Overseas Province experienced a period of sharp decline in population and economy, and cities and villages also declined sharply. Until now, the population of the Lan Fang Overseas Province has not recovered to the stage before the East African rule.

After all, the nationalization of land was too advanced for the people of the Lan Fang Overseas Province at that time. East Africa encountered fierce resistance in the Lan Fang Overseas Province. Finally, through physical suppression, a large number of people from the Lan Fang Overseas Province fled to the surrounding Dutch and British colonies, or to the indigenous forces on the island.

Pontianak is an exception in the Lan Fang Overseas Province. Although it also experienced population loss in the early days, in the 1990s, Pontianak entered a stage of rapid development and provided a foundation for East Africa to be incorporated into the Mindanao colony.

Because this is the political, economic, cultural and foreign exchange center of the Lan Fang Overseas Province, its special status has led to Pontianak being the only area that continued to develop in the early days of East African rule in the Lan Fang Overseas Province.

To be frank, Pontianak currently ranks first among the many towns in Kalimantan, surpassing some colonial towns that the British or Dutch have painstakingly managed on the island.

Entering the 20th century, due to economic development, Pontianak has begun to absorb the lower-class Chinese from the Nanyang region or the southern coast of the Far East Empire to immigrate here. The East African government calls this phenomenon "population return".

But in the same way, the increase in Chinese has also aroused the vigilance of the East African government. Although a large part of the original shares of the East African people are Chinese immigrants, the East African government has integrated Chinese immigrants into the main ethnic groups in East Africa through compulsory education, forced marriage, cultural transformation and other means, but most of the Chinese in the Lan Fang Overseas Province are completely different.

Moreover, the Lan Fang Overseas Province is far away from the East African mainland, and there are not enough white immigrants to hedge, dilute, and reconcile. In this way, there is a great hidden danger of independence in the Lan Fang Overseas Province. Now under the strong rule of the East African government and the stage of rapid economic development, the contradiction cannot be revealed, but the future is uncertain.

Therefore, in order to deal with the "irrational" population structure of overseas territories such as the Lan Fang Overseas Province, the East African government has put forward the political slogan of "accelerating the construction of overseas territories" since 1900.

Including immigration policies to import a large number of local population to Lan Fang Overseas Province, South Ryukyu Islands, North Hawaii Kingdom, Alaska Royal Territory, Mindanao Colony.

At that time, the population of East Africa was no longer as scarce as before, and it exceeded 80 million. It was also one of the most populous countries in the world, which also provided the basic conditions for East Africa to send population to overseas territories.

In the past, East Africa was like a Pixiu, which only ate but did not poop because of the lack of population. Now East Africa is troubled by the rapid population growth, and this distress is caused by industrialization. If industrialization cannot keep up with the population growth rate, East Africa may become a clown like Tsarist Russia in the future.

In addition to alleviating the pressure of local population growth, sending immigrants overseas can also consolidate East Africa's rule in overseas territories.

Fortunately, the territories of East Africa are sparsely populated, among which the Alaska Royal Territory, Lan Fang Overseas Province, Mindanao Colony and Madagascar Island can absorb a large number of people.

According to the final plan of the East African government, in order to effectively develop these colonies, East Africa will send at least one million people to these areas starting from 1904.

This immigration to Pontianak is the first demonstration site of this policy. As the most developed region in East Africa overseas, Pontianak has some significant advantages.

First of all, it has convenient sea transportation, and secondly, it has the most developed economic foundation in the overseas territories of East Africa. In the future, East Africa will use Pontianak City and other coastal cities in Lanfang Overseas Province as bases to gradually transport immigrants to the inland and establish a number of farms and plantations. At the same time, certain industries will be developed in Pontianak City to make it a model of governance for East African overseas territories.

As the ship docked at Pontianak Port, the first large-scale non-military immigrants from East Africa officially arrived in Pontianak. Many of these immigrants were young people.

“Warmly welcome you all to Lan Fong Province!” Lan Fang Overseas Province and the Pontianak City Government have shown a very enthusiastic attitude towards local immigrants.

"You are all talents of the empire. Although our Lanfang Overseas Province is a remote part of the empire, we will definitely provide you with the best conditions to build our homeland together!" Chris Sean, a senior official of Lanfang Overseas Province, said excitedly.

It is really not easy for officials of Lanfang Overseas Province such as Chris Sean. Although it is an important overseas territory of the empire and is included in the empire's provinces, among the many overseas territories in East Africa, the treatment of Lanfang Overseas Province is good. Say it's the only one.

However, no matter how resounding the name is, it cannot change the reality of poverty and backwardness in Lanfang Overseas Province, and even its economic development is slightly better than that of Alaska, which has even worse climate conditions.

As for Lan Fang Overseas Province, everything is lacking now, especially population. Only now has the population of Lan Fong Overseas Province recovered to 200,000, a large part of which is still concentrated in Pontianak City, while Lan Fong Overseas Province has Its area is more than 120,000 square kilometers, so the importance of population to Lan Fang Overseas Province is self-evident.

"Senior Officer Chris Sean, this time our fleet brought a total of more than 2,300 people. The importance of these young volunteers is self-evident. Many of them come to the places where the motherland needs it with enthusiasm to help. You are building, so you must take it seriously, and according to the instructions of the central government, in the next ten years, at least 100,000 local immigrants will be imported to Lanfang Overseas Province. You must do a good job in the preliminary work, and you cannot use the colonial approach. methods to manage these immigrants, but to follow local models.”

Regarding the words of the Immigration Department official, Chris Shawn solemnly promised: "Don't worry! Even if I, Chris Shawn, have a bite to eat, I will not let these domestic volunteers go hungry. For our province, these immigrants are The most precious wealth, the province’s resources will be given priority to them.”

"Very well, the importance of Lanfang Overseas Province in the empire's overseas territories is self-evident. The central government and the royal family are committed to building this place into the future economic center of the Nanyang region. I believe that under the leadership of Mr. Senior Official, Lanfang Overseas Province will We can go further in the future,” the immigration official said politely.