Chapter 537 The Past Seventies
"Prince Carl! Welcome to East Africa." Constantine stepped forward and said.
"Long time no see, Your Majesty Constantine, you are still so energetic."
Prince Karl gave Constantine a hug and now upgraded his title to Constantine, now Constantine was the king.
"Uncle Carl!"
"Haha, Ernst, I haven't seen you for a few years. You've become more mature now!"
The Hechingen royal family still attaches great importance to Sigmaringen. As the saying goes, when you become rich and powerful, don't forget your friends. The same is true for the relationship between Hechingen and Sigmaringen.
"Leopold, is he still in Germany?"
"Yes, he still holds an important position in the German army, and I, an old man, will explore the way for him, so that Sigmaringen can ensure the formation of three fulcrums in Romania, Germany and Africa."
The achievements made by the Hechingen royal family in Africa have made Sigmaringen completely uneasy, so at the invitation of the Hechingen royal family, Prince Carl personally came to East Africa to discuss the relevant matters of Sigmaringen's colonization of Africa.
Unlike the Hechingen royal family, Prince Karl's sons are all older, so there is no need for them to stand up for Ernst, who has no roots in Germany, like Constantine did. So this time Prince Karl came directly to East Africa, and his heir Leopold guaranteed Sigmaringen's status and influence in Germany.
Germany is still Sigmaringen's retreat route. If the African colonization plan fails, it can retreat. The confidence of Sigmaringen in colonizing Africa comes from Romania.
"Let's go back to the palace and let you settle down. After all, the climate in East Africa is different from that in Germany, especially at this season, so you need to adapt first." Constantine said to Prince Karl.
It is still winter in Germany, but East Africa near the equator is quite hot, so you should take it easy when you first arrive in East Africa.
However, the climate in Africa is quite suitable for elderly people like Constantine and Prince Karl, because the elderly like warmth and East Africa meets this condition.
Just like the elderly in the Far East like to retire in Panzhihua, or the elderly in the United States migrate from the northeast to the south.
Prince Carl and Constantine and his son then took a carriage to the Svet Palace, and Prince Carl finally saw the political center of this huge East African country.
"It's no exaggeration to say that the current First Town is no different from Berlin and Vienna when we were young. At that time, there were not many cities in Germany with a population of over 100,000. I want to know what the population of the First Town is now?"
"The population of the First Town is about 150,000. If calculated based on household registration, it should be just over 100,000." Ernst answered Prince Karl's question. He was quite familiar with this aspect of data.
"When I came here, I landed in Dar es Salaam. I heard that Dar es Salaam is the largest city in East Africa. I wonder if this is true?"
“Uncle Karl, if you count the new city, then it must be. Dar es Salaam has two urban areas, and the total population of the urban area is about 300,000.”
"It seems that the number of people you have migrated over the years must be very exaggerated. I didn't see many black people. I thought it would be at least like the United States!"
Constantine: "Old man, East Africa is a big country in the world in terms of land area and population, so it's not an exaggeration to say that there are several big cities. As for black people, there are quite a lot of them in East Africa, but our attitude towards black people is different from that of the United States, so it's not easy to see black people in the Central Province."
All construction projects in the Central Province have been completed long ago, so there are no major projects for the time being. In addition, the Central Province was the first to implement the policy of replacing slaves with livestock, so now in the Central Province you can only see a relatively large number of black people in the Dar es Salaam slave market.
The more than 100,000 black soldiers left over from the last Portuguese-Eastern War have not yet been sold out. The Ottoman Empire has the largest order, which is about 50,000 to 60,000 and can be directly deployed to the front line. There are also 20,000 to 30,000 sent to the United States.
Constantine's words made Prince Carl understand that there must be a large number of non-black people in East Africa now, otherwise East Africa would not be able to not use black people.
East Africa certainly uses slaves, but they are now mainly concentrated in other areas to contribute to East Africa's agriculture and infrastructure. However, even if deslavement is completed in only one place, the Central Province, it would be a significant progress.
“Can you tell me about the population you have immigrated to East Africa over the years?”
Prince Karl still wanted to clarify this point. He would feel uncomfortable if he didn't ask. However, the population size of East Africa has always been a top-level state secret, so Constantine glanced at Ernst and asked him to answer the question.
Ernst understood and said, "Uncle Carl, we don't have detailed statistics on this, but it should be several million, probably more than seven or eight million. After all, East African immigration has been going on for more than ten years, and we have only recently started to collect population data, so we don't know much about this aspect."
It will take another two or three months to complete the census, but the total number of people has already been calculated. Now we are collecting data on regions and population, that is, characteristics and details.
It's not that Ernst intended to hide it from Prince Karl, but the fewer people who know about this kind of thing, the better. If word gets out that the population of East Africa has reached more than 30 million, approaching 35 million, I'm afraid many people will have trouble sleeping. If the number of black people is included, the figure will directly exceed 50 million.
Although Ernst provided Prince Carl with a greatly discounted false data, the data still shocked Prince Carl.
A country with a population of seven or eight million is considered a medium-sized country in Europe. After all, a country with a population of over ten million is considered a populous country in Europe. A population of seven or eight million is already larger than most European countries.
"You have surpassed Bavaria now? This is incredible!"
The population of Bavaria should be between four and six million, but it certainly does not exceed six million, so seven or eight million is indeed more than the population of Bavaria.
"We have also caught up with good times in recent years. One reason is that the birth rate in Germany and Europe has greatly increased, and the economic crisis happened to happen in the past few years, so we seized the opportunity to get a large number of people from Europe."
The actual data is certainly more than that. During the entire economic crisis, East Africa immigrated about six to seven million people from all over the world. It is worth mentioning that the economic crisis of 1873 has not yet ended completely, but the impact is not as great as it was at the beginning. Now the center of the economic crisis is Britain. According to the original transmission path, it broke out in Austria and then developed in Germany. The United States suffered the greatest losses, and Britain ended up with it.
Although the economic crisis in Europe has largely ended, the economy is still in a depressed state compared to before. According to past experience, this depressed state will probably continue until the beginning of the twentieth century, which is also called a chronic economic depression.
The biggest beneficiary of this long-term depression was East Africa, which had made preparations in advance. Not only did it introduce a large number of people and machinery and equipment, but its greatest achievement was the construction of basic national defense and military industries, East African railway network, shipbuilding industry, electric power industry, steel industry, and the completion of a large number of infrastructure projects, as well as the purchase of a powerful East African navy.
It is worth mentioning that the introduction of a large number of talents to East Africa was also achieved through the economic crisis. The bankruptcy of a large number of companies in Europe and the United States provided an opportunity for the development of East Africa. This is also the reason why East Africa's power industry and other fields can get started.
The entire 1870s was also the fastest developing decade in East Africa, which almost pulled sub-Saharan Africa, a region with no industrial and agricultural foundation at all, directly into an agricultural society and the most basic industrial society.
This is not a leap from zero to one, but a direct leap from zero to 2.5, that is, it directly jumps from primitive society to feudal agricultural society and then to primary industrial society, omitting the slave society and feudal society in between.
Of course, slavery and feudal systems also existed in East Africa, and primitive society actually existed in the West as well. The current East Africa can be fully called a living fossil of human society, and all stages of human society can be fully examined.
(End of this chapter)
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