Chapter 1611 North African Free Trade Area
After the North African railway is fully opened, East Africa is also preparing to develop its layout around this line, and Darfur, an originally unimportant region, will naturally also have to make big moves.
The first thing to be clear is that along the entire North African railway, especially along the approximately 1,500-kilometer section from northern Darfur to southern Italian Libya, the number of towns, population and freight demand is basically negligible.
Along the 1,500-kilometer journey, there are only a handful of small oases and water sources, such as the town of Jiaofu, which is the largest town along this section of the railway, with a population of only a thousand people and no output of its own.
Therefore, if we want to tap the potential of the North African Railway, we can only start from both ends of the North African Railway. Italian Libya mainly depends on the Italian government, while Darfur and the North African Railway in East Africa are under the responsibility and management of East Africa.
East Africa, Rhine City.
Crown Prince Friedrich said at a government work conference: "Now that the North African railway has been opened, the land trade route between East Africa and Italy, and North Africa to the entire Mediterranean market has been completed."
"How are the preparations going in Darfur and the relevant provinces within mainland China?"
East Africa naturally could not fight an unprepared war for the construction of the North African Railway. It had already begun to prepare for related matters long before the North African Railway strategic project was officially confirmed.
Minister of Land and Natural Resources, Cherlaid, was the first to report, saying, "Your Highness, regarding the Darfur region, we have conducted detailed surveys based on local conditions for nearly ten years."
"We have summarized the advantages of Darfur's economic development into the following three key points. The first is transportation, which is one of Darfur's most important advantages. It is located at the intersection of landlocked countries, namely us, the Kingdom of South Germany, Egypt, and Italy."
"Moreover, the opening of the North African Railway has greatly improved Darfur's transportation status, making it a regional transportation hub."
"This requires Darfur to strengthen its ties with Italy, South Germany, and Egypt, in addition to us. Darfur may become an important commercial and trade exchange center between our four countries."
"Furthermore, Darfur can use the North African Railway to extend its trade routes further, such as strengthening trade activities with French Libya, Tunisia, or other countries in Europe and the Middle East."
There is no doubt that Darfur's geographical location is obviously not favorable in the era of maritime transportation, and its land location is not very advantageous either.
That being said, land transportation is still the lifeline for Darfur's development. Darfur's current situation is like that of those Central Asian countries. They have no other choice but to develop land transportation.
However, Darfur is lucky in that East Africa is located above it. If it were not a colony of East Africa, it would be very difficult for Darfur to even build a decent road, let alone a project like the North African Railway.
Cherled continued, "For Darfur right now, the most important thing is to strengthen cooperation with the Kingdom of Southern Germany, open up a trade route from the Kingdom of Southern Germany to southern Darfur, and take on the function of cargo transit."
Darfur is adjacent to the most densely populated and economically developed area of the Kingdom of South Germany, so in theory the two countries have a natural basis for cooperation, especially for the area east of the Shari River Basin in South Germany adjacent to Darfur.
As for Egypt, if the Sudan region under its jurisdiction wants to cooperate with Darfur for political reasons, it will need to spend more time and effort on negotiations.
The Sudan region is actually an ideal area for Darfur to develop trade, because the two are not far apart, and with the North African Railway, if goods from the Sudan region want to reach Europe as quickly as possible, Darfur becomes one of the best choices.
Unfortunately, Sudan’s development is not up to it, as there are two big mountains above it, namely Egypt and Britain.
It goes without saying that Britain would not allow too much communication between Sudan and Darfur. Egypt's attitude towards East Africa is also wavering. Egypt is very afraid of East Africa.
Just like Poland and Western Ukraine facing the Soviet Union, Egypt is also worried about the northward movement of East African forces. Although East Africa has no intention of attacking Egypt, historical experience tells Egypt that East Africa is definitely a more terrifying country than Britain.
At most, Britain wanted to enslave Egypt economically and suck the blood of the Egyptians. However, in the past, Britain did not give people a chance to survive in East Africa. It destroyed countless countries in Africa and was good at solving problems once and for all physically.
Darfur itself is a good example. The people living in Darfur now are a completely different group of people.
Of course, Egypt’s idea was definitely not wrong. At least during the period when Ernst was in sole control of the empire, if he had the opportunity, he would definitely reform Egypt to break the connection point between the Arab religious forces in the Middle East and North Africa, that is, Egypt. Egypt itself is a Middle Eastern country and a North African country, so it is the place where the two regions intersect.
However, history did not give Ernst such an opportunity, which allowed Egypt to escape. East Africa was too weak in the early days, and Egypt had the support of Britain and even the whole of Europe.
No European country, especially the major powers, wants to see East Africa occupy Egypt, because in this way, East Africa will be able to completely monopolize the East-West maritime trade routes and control the lifeline of the entire Europe.
Therefore, it is better for Egypt to remain in the hands of the British than to be controlled by East Africa. After all, Britain can only use the Suez Canal to target its hostile countries, but it will never dare to provoke public anger.
East Africa is completely different. Given the size of East Africa, if Egypt falls into the hands of East Africa, even if Europe becomes a whole, it will be helpless against East Africa, which will easily make the whole of Europe feel insecure.
In dealing with this issue, East Africa plays a role similar to that of the Soviet Union and Russia in its previous life. If possible, Europe will obviously use all means to weaken and suppress this superpower.
Fortunately, in the early 20th century, Europe was not a whole, so it was impossible for Europeans to unite. Although East Africa could also put pressure on Europe, the two sides were separated by the Mediterranean Sea and the Sahara Desert. Therefore, the deterrent force that East Africa brought to Europe was far less strong than that of the Soviet Union.
At the same time, Germany became unprecedentedly powerful after the merger of Germany and Austria. Therefore, Germany had a certain degree of confidence when facing superpowers such as the Soviet Union and East Africa. Europe has not completely become a spectator of the world order and can play a certain leadership role.
After discussing the transportation issue, Cherled began his second point: "Transportation is crucial for revitalizing Darfur's economy. The general situation is this: Darfur's second advantage is agriculture, which is currently Darfur's most important industry."
"Darfur is an arid region, but its southern part has huge agricultural potential that is far from being developed. If it can be utilized, southern Darfur can feed millions of people, while the current population of Darfur is only a few hundred thousand."
"In agriculture, Darfur's main specialty is gum arabic, a crop widely used in the food industry. However, single-crop farming is not very helpful to Darfur."
"Therefore, Darfur's future development should accelerate the expansion of new sectors from a technological perspective, especially in the field of cash crop cultivation. We believe that Darfur still has considerable potential, for example, many tropical cash crops that cannot be grown in Europe."
"Darfur can achieve agricultural progress by breeding improved varieties and promoting water-saving agriculture."
The conditions for agricultural development in Darfur are definitely not good, but because of its vast land and sparse population, at least the people in Darfur are living a good life for now.
However, from the perspective of long-term development, if Darfur wants to become rich, it must pay more sweat and cost, whether it is the transportation mentioned above or agriculture.
"Finally, Darfur's advantage, and what is currently most beneficial to the Darfur economy, is its rich mineral resources. This is also the main achievement of our Ministry of Land and Resources in recent years," said Cherled.
The development of mineral resources is the only shortcut for Darfur to achieve leapfrog economic development, so Cherled said this is the most important point.
As long as the local mineral resources can be developed, Darfur will be able to quickly recover funds and invest them in the construction of areas such as transportation and agriculture.
After all, the most important problem for Darfur to achieve transportation and agricultural development is lack of money, while the income from mineral resources is stable and huge. Of course, the premise is that Darfur itself is rich in mineral resources.
Cherled is quite confident about this. He said: "Through our exploration in recent years, Darfur is still rich in mineral resources and has huge potential."
"We have already discovered several important mineral resources in Darfur that are worth developing, primarily oil and natural gas."
"Several oil and gas fields have been discovered in southern Darfur. They belong to the same petroleum geological distribution zone as the Jezira Plain crude oil field. Our experts also speculate that southern Darfur has the conditions for oil generation, but with current technology, it is very difficult to develop them."
In the past, South Sudan and North Sudan were both important oil-producing countries, so it is not surprising that Darfur, which belongs to North Sudan, also has certain oil resources. Of course, the reserves are certainly not comparable to the Nile Province in East Africa.
However, Darfur's oil and gas resources are also an important asset to Darfur, especially since Darfur's population is not large now.
"Secondly, Darfur has rich gold reserves. If these gold mines can be effectively developed, they will definitely play a huge role in promoting Darfur's development."
Before the colonization of East Africa, Darfur was an important gold producing area in North Africa, but it was not effectively developed due to backward technology and low production efficiency.
"Our Ministry of Land and Resources has also suggested that the local government give priority to developing local gold mines to complete the accumulation of original capital."
"In addition to oil, gas, and gold, Darfur also has an important strategic resource: uranium, which is relatively abundant and high-grade. This is a strategic material worthy of attention for the Empire."
East Africa has been developing its nuclear industry, but progress has been slow. This is not because East Africa lacks technology and personnel, but for the sake of stability. After all, the hazards of radioactive substances are self-evident. East Africa's research in this area is much more cautious than that of European and American countries.
In addition, East Africa pays more attention to the transformation of technological breakthroughs during the research process, so as to obtain real benefits more quickly.
This is not the Cold War era of the past. For political reasons, the Soviet Union and the United States are also very eager for quick success and instant benefits in scientific research, competing with each other to demonstrate the superiority of their systems.
This is reflected in the aerospace projects of the two countries in the past. Both countries spent a lot of financial and material resources, but the returns were pitifully low. It was more like a face-saving project, which made the Soviet Union's finances even worse and people's livelihood declined, becoming one of the important reasons for its disintegration. The United States achieved seemingly brilliant achievements, but after the disintegration of the Soviet Union, many technological achievements were not properly handled. Some of them were directly lost in the 21st century due to institutional rigidity, personnel decline, poor archive management, and the collapse of related companies.
For example, in the U.S. moon landing project, many instruments and equipment were made entirely by hand in order to speed up the process, without any transformation, integration or application to real industries. Without continued government subsidies, relevant technicians and companies naturally would not pay attention to these technologies.
Now, in the development of the aerospace industry, East Africa pays more attention to the transformation of results and the filing of breakthrough technologies.
Of course, East Africa does not face the same competitive pressure as during the Cold War, so it can steadily advance the development of these major projects and scientific research projects without haste.
Even so, East Africa is now a leader in nuclear engineering and aerospace engineering, because there are not many players in this field. The United States and Germany have not yet completely escaped the aftermath of the Great Depression, and the Soviet Union has not yet completed its industrialization. Other countries are even more powerless.
Cheryl said, "Uranium is a strategic asset for the future, but it's not very meaningful now, just like Darfur's oil and gas resources. That's why I suggested developing the local gold mines first."
"In addition to gold mines, Darfur's iron ore, copper mines, and kaolin also have the potential for large-scale mining. However, their returns are not as high as gold, so they can be developed after gold."
"These are the key minerals we have discovered in Darfur. There are still many mineral resources in Darfur, but they are not large in scale."
Darfur has a lot of mineral resources. After all, Darfur has a large area of more than 800,000 square kilometers. If Darfur were a country, its area would be much larger than many countries in the world.
The current survey results of the East African Ministry of Land and Natural Resources are far from the limit of Darfur's mineral resources, because most of Darfur is a desert or the natural environment is too harsh and has not been effectively surveyed.
However, the current survey results alone are a huge asset for Darfur, which has a population of only tens of thousands.
Crown Prince Friedrich said: "Very good. Therefore, in Darfur, we should prioritize activating its transportation advantages. To this end, we should build Darfur into a free trade zone in North Africa, thereby accelerating its connection with neighboring countries and regions and promoting commercial trade construction centered on the North African railway."
(End of this chapter)
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