African Entrepreneurship Records

Chapter 626 Closed and open

“Dire Dawa City also wants to engage in border trade. Do you think this business is feasible?”

"Actually, the idea of ​​Dire Dawa City may not be unrealizable, but practical factors must be taken into consideration. For example, the coast of the Red Sea is originally a place where merchants gather, so I think their plan is very unreliable. Our own ships sometimes Selling goods along the Red Sea, not to mention the fact that the Red Sea now relies on the Suez Canal to connect the two major markets of Europe and Asia, there is no shortage of goods."

"This is not necessarily true. Sea transportation is convenient, but it may not be able to meet all needs. For example, for the tropical cash crops in the Northern Province, we must sell them to Europe first, because other regions do not have the purchasing power, or we are not satisfied with their quotations. Therefore, the market demand is not a cold number, but a flexible one. Dire Dawa City is on the border, so there may not be such a market. It is just not worth our investment. Instead, we must give full play to the capabilities of the market and border people to develop the market. .”

There are two markets that East Africa attaches most importance to, one is Europe and the other is the Far East. The European market mainly supplies raw materials. After all, East African industrial products will definitely not be able to compete with Germany and Austria, while the Far East is the main sales area for East Africa's industrial products.

Although the Middle East is the closest to East Africa, a large part of it is managed by Zanzibar merchants, and the sales channels are in the hands of Zanzibar merchants. They purchase goods from East Africa, and whether they can make money in the end depends on their own methods.

Moreover, countries in the Middle East are not as rich as in the previous life. The Ottoman Empire was too big to fail, so the talking heads in the region are still there, unlike the Arab countries in the previous life.

A large part of the Ottoman Empire's industrial products came from Europe. It was not easy to squeeze in the East African industrial products, and the Arabs were relatively shrewd. Don't look at the current decline. In the long Middle Ages, the Arab region was the prosperous area of ​​commerce in the world, especially It relied on the ancient Silk Road to monopolize trade between the East and the West. It was only after the Age of Discovery that the Europeans broke the monopoly.

East Africa mainly follows the Omani route. Oman and Zanzibar have the same origin, and Oman is an independent Arab country. In the past, the Indian Ocean coast was a traditional maritime power, and maritime countries were not bad at commerce, especially Oman, which is very dependent on overseas countries. trading country.

The sales of industrial products are mainly controlled by the East African government in the Far East. Although the quality of East African industrial products is poor, the price is low, and the quality depends on how you classify it. Compared with Europe, it is definitely worse, but it is still suitable for countries other than Europe and the United States. With some advantages, especially after the economic crisis of 1873, East Africa introduced a lot of European equipment and technology.

 The largest exports from East Africa are definitely raw materials, with grain, tropical cash crops, and minerals as the main content.

 As for the destination countries for raw material exports, the more developed the industry, the stronger the demand. Obviously, such regions are the Central and Eastern European countries, mainly the German region.

 Only with certain industries can a large amount of raw materials be consumed, and many raw materials for industrial development cannot be fully available in Europe, especially the three countries of Germany, Austria and Russia, which are located in the interior of Europe.

However, there is nothing wrong with being a supplier of raw materials, especially for East Africa at present. It has fewer things to do, can make money, and can also consolidate relations with relevant countries.

After all, raw material production is different from industry. It does not require too advanced and complex technologies, and management is relatively convenient. Even feudal countries can do well in this aspect. The flexibility in rural areas is much higher than that in cities, because agriculture itself brings It has the characteristics of self-sufficiency. If it is an industry, it is extremely dependent on the market.

When workers are unemployed, the risks they face are much higher. As for farmers, of course they are also at risk of unemployment, but usually they encounter famines, food harvests fail, or the land is annexed, and they become tenant farmers with hired labor, like the owner-cultivators in this era. Very nice, especially for European yeoman farmers.

East Africa will not have this problem for the time being, because East Africa is a collective agricultural model, with concentrated agricultural production, but it is different from traditional manors, capitalist farms, or collective farms, and has the characteristics of all aspects. In other words, the left is not left enough and the right is not right enough, forming a mixed agricultural economic system. However, Ernst is not easy to change now. In the West, people are very particular about choosing sides and a black-and-white philosophical thinking. The problem is that no matter whether it was a capitalist country or a democratic country in the previous life, planning and market could not be completely eliminated. There is me among you, and you among me. It is nothing more than a question of share.

As a country that supplies large amounts of raw materials, East Africa’s agricultural model is relatively stable, with steady progress in agricultural output every year. There are no big ups and downs, and more will come naturally.

Correspondingly, East Africa's agricultural output is generally in excess. If it were a normal country, East Africa should now reduce production on a large scale to balance its balance of payments. However, East Africa is not a normal country, and the international market does not have that much demand, so East Africa can only use its own initiative and use the domestic market to absorb excess agricultural production capacity.

 Including various large-scale projects, national infrastructure construction, and production capacity contraction. Production capacity contraction is not a real contraction, but a further optimization and rational allocation of agricultural resources.

A lot of cultivated land has been opened up in East Africa, but it is withdrawn and restored every year. There are also a lot of cultivated lands that are converted into forests and grasslands, especially in the eastern region.

 This is the case in the Northern Province, which mainly converts farmland into grassland. A large number of pastures have been eliminated. At the same time, the planting of cash crops is actively promoted in order to seek higher economic value.

“The problem in Dire Dawa City is not a simple economic issue, but involves a national problem. There are currently close to ten open port cities in East Africa, some of which have not even been completed, while Dire Dawa City and these coastal areas are greatly in need. different.

It represents the border trade problem in East Africa. Border trade has always existed, but we have not liberalized it on the surface. The main purpose of border trade in the northern Turkana Province is to transfuse blood to the Abyssinian Empire and prevent They were at a disadvantage in the competition with Italy, and the same was true for our arms trade with the Orangemen in the south. "

"Dire Dawa is also an important military town, so it is more worthy of our discussion here. The first issue it considers should be military issues. Of course, from the perspective of immigration, the local economy must be developed, otherwise it will only rely on Government financial support can only relieve urgent needs. The city of Gezira in Nile Province is doing very well here.

Of course, the situation in Gezira City is also very special. Gezira City has the best conditions in the entire Nile Province, is suitable for development, and is located on the border. However, the conditions in Dire Dawa City are much worse than Gezira City. . "

"In the final analysis, it is still a question of whether Dire Dawa City should be opened. I think it should be opened. East Africa is no longer what it used to be. We should be the most powerful country in Africa. Security issues are no longer very significant. The strongest force in the north is Italy. People and the British, and the British have controlled Egypt a few years ago, but we are mainly bordered by Sudan and British Somaliland in the Bab el-Mandeb Strait. The threat is not at the same level as Cape Town.

Not to mention Italy, which poses almost no military threat and needs our support to gain a foothold on the Ethiopian plateau. "

This is not because East African officials humiliated Italy, but because of the traditional psychological superiority of the Germans over the Italians. Italy itself is not a strong country, especially after the restoration of the Kingdom of Naples, which is slightly stronger than the Kingdom of Portugal in the eyes of East Africa.

 (End of this chapter)