Greece to roman road

The office of the palace in the spacious Syntagma Square was quiet. The writing sound of the pen tip rubbing against the paper was clearly audible. Crown Prince Constantine was concentrating on official duties.

More than half a year has passed since the war between Greece and Bulgaria ended, but there seems to be more troublesome work: the reception of newly recovered territories, the restoration of domestic order and production, the disarmament of the army, and the railway in Macedonia. Issues related to the construction of roads, the development of new territories in Greece, etc.

"Dudududu"

There was a rapid knock on the door.

"Come in," Constantine put down the pen in his hand and rubbed his sore eyebrows.

"Squeak", the door of the office was opened. The attendant in black uniform first gave a respectful military salute, holding a volume of documents in his left hand, and said respectfully: "Your Royal Highness, the government has just released the data of various departments this year. The information has been sent, in addition to the economic data of European countries fed back by Greek overseas agencies, which have been compiled."

When he heard that the important documents had arrived, Constantine started up, stood up from the high-backed chair, came to the desk in person, and took the documents from the attendant's hands.

It was already the end of 1913, and the impressive year 1914 was about to begin. Constantine was eager to know the details of Greece and other European countries. These data would be an important basis for future national decisions.

Constantine looked through the documents carefully. Greece's economic data did not disappoint him, and soon a joyful smile appeared on his face.

Greece's economy has developed by leaps and bounds. In terms of total industrial output alone (gdp is a later indicator, which has not yet appeared in this era, and the common indicator for measuring economic data is industrial output), in 1913 Greece's total industrial output reached 2 billion drachma, an increase of approximately 30% compared to 1912

The reason for such gratifying results is probably because the development of the Macedonian region has begun to show results.

For a long time, due to the competition between Macedonia and three neighboring countries, mainly Greece, Serbia, and Bulgaria, social order was chaotic and production activities were disrupted.

Now that the ownership of Macedonia has been settled, Greece successfully obtained most of the Macedonian territory through two wars in 1912 and 1913.

Under the urging of Constantine and the operation of the Venizelos government, social order in Macedonia has been restored, peace and tranquility have been restored to people's lives, and economic and production activities that have been suppressed for a long time have been released.

The lives of the people here are no longer under constant threat as before. They live a precarious life, and the enthusiasm for production is like a volcanic eruption.

Even with rapid development, according to the Greek government's predictions, Macedonia's economic growth still has huge potential to be tapped.

If you want to fully realize the potential of the Macedonian region, it will have to be at least the end of 1916, assuming everything goes well.

By then, Greece's economic strength will reach a new level.

Added to this is the rapid development of Thessaloniki’s industrial area.

In the second half of 1913, Salonika relied on its more favorable geographical location and excellent transportation conditions to radiate the advantages of the entire Macedonian agricultural production area. The Salonika Industrial Zone overthrew the Athens Industrial Zone and became the largest industry in Greece. district.

Within half a year, the machines and equipment imported by various companies from Western European countries have been put into operation in Thessaloniki and started to be used for production.

Soldiers who had previously been recruited for war mobilization also began to enter the factory one after another after demobilization, providing sufficient human resources for production.

In addition, Constantine also noticed an important message displayed in the document: Germany's industrial output surpassed that of the United Kingdom, becoming the largest industrial power in Europe.

Internationally, Germany's industrial output ranks second in the world after the United States.

The United Kingdom's industrial output was surpassed by the United States in 1898, and it lost its title as the world's largest industrial power. Now it is even ranked second. The mood at this moment must be very bitter.

The industrial output value rankings of European countries are Germany, the United Kingdom, France, Russia, the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and Italy, while the industrial output value of Greece is close to that of the Netherlands, which ranks seventh.

Although there is still a clear gap between Greece's industrial output and developed countries in Western Europe, Greece is also making rapid progress and catching up.

Benefiting from the rapid economic development, the Greek government's fiscal revenue has also increased.

In 1913, fiscal revenue reached 100 million drachmas, an increase of 32% compared with 1912.

The road and railway mileage in Macedonia has reached 3,600 kilometers, of which 1,200 kilometers are open to traffic.

In terms of roads, due to the long construction period, the roads in Macedonia invested and built by the government are still under construction.

According to the plan of the government's transportation department, after completion of construction, the road mileage in Macedonia will reach 4,000 kilometers.

Under the supervision of Constantine, the Venizelos government was under great financial pressure. Immediately after the war, it eagerly invested large sums of money in Macedonia.

The reason why Constantine did this was due to many considerations: firstly, it could enhance Greece's control over the Macedonian region, and secondly, it was the need to develop the economy.

Now the Macedonian regional railway construction plan is basically completed. Starting from the train station in Athens and passing through the transportation hub of Thessaloniki, you can reach Durrës in Albania, Skopje in North Macedonia, and Sise in two days. Kavala of Reis.

In terms of coal production, in 1913, Greece's lignite production reached a record high of 12 million tons.

Greece's lignite reserves are still very abundant. According to current mineral exploration data, the lignite reserves that have been discovered in Greece have reached 4 billion tons.

Whether it is lignite reserves or lignite mining volume, it ranks first among European countries (except Russia).

Seeing that the mining volume of lignite in Greece has been growing rapidly, reaching 12 million tons this year, Constantine smiled with relief.

It was true that Constantine personally traveled across the ocean to New York, USA, and invited Tesla to come to Greece to help Greece build an alternating current system.

The current results show that this is a wise decision!

The slow development of Greek industry at that time was due to the lack of hard coal in Greece.

The use of lignite combustion to generate electricity not only solves Greece's energy supply problem, but also allows Greece to catch up with the spring breeze of the electrical industrial revolution.

In the absence of hard coal, high-quality oil, and large rivers with abundant water flows, Greece's industry can develop rapidly without worrying about energy shortages, thanks to Greece's mature thermal power generation technology.

Almost all of this lignite was supplied to thermal power plants for combustion and power generation. In 1913, Greece's power generation reached 1.5 million kilowatt hours.

For comparison, Germany's power generation capacity is 8 million kilowatt-hours, the United Kingdom's 2.5 million kilowatt-hours, France's 1.8 million kilowatt-hours, and Italy's 2 million kilowatt-hours.

Benefiting from Greece's pioneering development of the power industry, if we look at the power generation alone, Greece's power generation is completely on the same level as that of major European countries.

As the first country in the world to establish a mature alternating current system, electricity, as the most important energy source, plays an important role in Greece.

Due to the lack of hard coal with high calorific value, the Greek domestic textile industry has completely abandoned the backward steam engine-powered textile machines and all uses cutting-edge electric textile machines.

This allows the Greek textile industry to travel lightly, overtake in corners, and achieve high production efficiency. Unlike countries in Western Europe, which struggle with whether to eliminate backward steam textile machines and purchase electric textile machines with higher production efficiency.

In traditional industries such as the textile industry, factory owners in developed countries in Western Europe purchased a large number of steam spinning machines. However, after the second industrial revolution, these machines consumed more energy and had lower production efficiency than electric spinning machines, requiring more A lot of labor.

Eliminating these backward machines and purchasing new machines will undoubtedly increase the cost of factory owners, and thus they are resisted and resisted.

The rapid development of the electric power industry has brought endless benefits to the Greek textile industry.

This year, the number of cotton spinners in Greece reached 1.5 million, the highest in history, an increase of 21% compared to last year.

The rapid development of the cotton textile industry has not only improved the development of the chemical industry (dyes), but has also made Greece's demand for cotton hit new highs.

The abundant sunshine in Macedonia also provides conditions for cotton cultivation.

The rapid development of Greece's cotton textile industry caused the price of raw cotton to rise sharply, which greatly stimulated the reclamation of wasteland in Macedonia.

According to government statistics, 20,000 hectares of land were developed in Macedonia in half a year.

By the end of the year, Greece's raw cotton production also hit a new high, reaching an output of 30,000 tons.

Despite this, it still cannot meet the needs of textile companies. Greece still imported 80,000 tons of cotton this year.

As land reclamation work in Macedonia went smoothly, Greece achieved a bumper harvest of 1.8 million tons of wheat and 200,000 tons of potatoes.

The total export value was 300 million drachmas, of which the largest export destination was the Ottoman Empire, which reached 800 million drachmas.

The value of Greek exports to the Ottoman Empire was currently stagnant and growing slowly.

Seeing this, Constantine frowned. After the opening of the Berlin-Baghdad railway, the relationship between Germany and the Ottomans became increasingly close, not only politically, but also militarily, and economically.

More and more German industrial products flooded the Ottoman Empire's market.

For the Greek industry, this is undoubtedly a hidden concern.

Although the economy is developing rapidly, not all data have improved significantly.

Greece's total oil production is still 800,000 tons.

At present, in addition to meeting Greece's crude oil consumption, there is still excess production capacity for export to Italy.

In terms of energy deposits, such as oil and coal mines, Italy's resource endowments are not as good as those of Greece.

Not only does Italy not have a drop of oil, even lignite, which can only be used for power generation, is not as abundant as Greece in terms of reserves.

In 1913, of the 800,000 tons of oil produced by the Hellenic Petroleum Company, 150,000 tons were exported to Italy.

But that may soon be changing.

After Andros Industries raised funds in the stock market, the automobile assembly line it invested in Thessaloniki has been put into operation.

At present, the factory has produced 18,000 trucks and cars. In the context of the large-scale development of Macedonia, the Greek people's demand for transportation has increased rapidly, and these trucks and cars were quickly sold out.

The current number of cars in Greece, including cars, trucks, and tractors, totals about 50,000.

Constantine speculated that with the development of Greece's automobile industry, the oil in Albania would not only be unable to meet Greece's own needs, but would also need to import oil.

Under the operation of the Royal Greek Petroleum Company, the oil field production in the city of Ferry in the Albanian region has reached its limit. Although the oil company racked its brains to increase the production of the oil field, it has failed.

The oil field has small reserves, poor quality crude oil and high sulfur content. It is also a heavy oil field.

In addition, there is steel production volume.

Although the Thessaloniki Industrial Zone adopted cutting-edge electric furnace steelmaking technology, Greece's steel output did not increase significantly in 1913, reaching only 860,000 tons.

The United States ranks first in the world in steel production, reaching 31.8 million tons, Germany 17.6 million tons, the United Kingdom 7.78 million tons, Russia 4.91 million tons, France 4.68 million tons, Austria-Hungary 2.61 million tons, and Italy 920,000 tons.

Greece's steel production was still not as good as Italy's, which made Constantine very depressed.

Greece's steel production has stayed at the level of 800,000 tons for several consecutive years, and its growth has been very slow, mainly because the production costs of Greek steel companies are too high.

Greece has no iron ore and also lacks hard coal. Both of these raw materials for steel production need to be imported.

Iron ore is purchased from southern Spain, or scrapped ships are purchased, dismantled and resmelted.

Hard coal was imported from the United Kingdom. In 1913, Greece imported 1.6 million tons of hard coal from the United Kingdom. In addition to being used for steelmaking, it was also in demand for trains, ships, etc.

Precisely because of high production costs, Greek steel plants have not been profitable since they were put into operation.

In order to keep the steel plant operating, Constantine not only instructed the Royal Bank to provide a large number of low-interest loans to the steel plant, but also repeatedly asked the Greek government for steel production subsidies and preferential tax exemptions.

Because the Greek Steel Company is not only the only steel factory in Greece, but also the largest arms supplier to the Greek army.

The production of artillery and firearms is also the business of the steel factory.

Military manufacturing and steel smelting are two major money-losing businesses. Even with a lot of support, the steel plant only broke even and never made any money.

Because it is unprofitable, so far, there is only one steel factory in Greece, the Greek Steel Factory.

This steel mill owns two plants, one in the Athens Industrial Zone and the other in the Thessaloniki Industrial Zone.

Beyond that, no one wanted to invest in steel smelting, as it was well known in Greek business circles that it was not profitable.

If steel is not enough, aluminum will make up for it.

Due to the shortage of steel, Greece's electrolytic aluminum and aluminum alloy industries have developed rapidly.

In 1913, Greek aluminum production reached 20,000 tons.

This output is already the first in Europe.

In order to save steel, in Greece, when aluminum alloy or pure aluminum can be used, aluminum is used first, and steel will be used unless it is absolutely necessary.

Aluminum lunch boxes and cauldrons are used in the army. The buttons on soldiers' uniforms are also made of aluminum alloy. The wheels and frames of bicycles or motorcycles are also made of aluminum alloy.

Due to large-scale production and application, Greece's aluminum alloy technology has developed rapidly in recent years.

Greece’s power industry is mature and there is no shortage of bauxite, which provides the basis for Greece to vigorously develop electrolytic aluminum.

At present, Greece's own bauxite reserves have reached 1 billion tons, so there is no need to worry about a lack of raw materials.

In terms of population, by the end of 1913, the population of Greece reached 13 million.

Greece's population continues to grow steadily, and growth is accelerating.

From 1897 to 1912 to 1913, the Greek army won three out of three battles. The national spirit was unprecedentedly high. The economy was also developing at a rapid pace. There was ample food supply and full of hope for future life. The combination of these factors was the encouragement of Greece's fertility policy. , making Greek women’s desire to have children extremely high.

Since the end of the war in the first half of the year, when hundreds of thousands of young people recruited by the Greek army were demobilized and returned to society, in just six months, Greece has had more than 900,000 new babies.

There are indications that a combination of these favorable factors is triggering a baby boom in Greece.