Chapter 830 Reservoir
"The current population of Sigmaringen is about 700,000, but there are less than 50,000 white immigrants and more than 600,000 Chinese."
"You East Africans are taking advantage of us. We can't recruit many Germans in Sigmaringen. Even the Romanians are not very active in developing in Chad."
No wonder Prince Karl was so excited. Although he complained a little, Ernst could understand Prince Karl's feelings. It was mainly because money was the key to his success, because the royal territory of Sigmaringen had already started to make a profit.
Sigmaringen has been investing in Chad for several years, and now the Sigmaringen royal territory has become quite large.
Of course, the Sigmaringen Royal Domain cannot be compared with East Africa, but it also has a pivotal position in the colonies of the world. Its area alone is nearly one million square kilometers. Compared with the African colonies of Belgium, Italy and other countries, it is not a little bit larger. Only East Africa, France and Britain can suppress the Sigmaringen Royal Domain in Africa.
It is good to lean on a big tree for shade. With the support of East Africa, the most powerful country in Africa, Sigmaringen has reaped benefits that many countries cannot imagine with only minimal investment.
The largest investment is the western section of the East African Northern Railway, but the bulk of the northern railway is still borne by East Africa, so Sigmaringen can be said to have borrowed the help of East Africa.
After the completion of the northern railway, the population of the Sigmaringen royal family increased dramatically, and a large number of immigrants passed through the northern railway of East Africa and finally entered the Chad region.
Of course, as Prince Karl said, the main problem of Sigmaringen is that it is difficult to absorb the German population, and it can only eat the leftovers of East Africa. Currently, there are even many East Africans serving as officials in the government of the royal territory of Sigmaringen.
There is no way around it, because the immigrants to Sigmaringen are mainly from the Far Eastern Empire, so the experience in governing the Chinese will naturally be handed over by the East African government to the Sigmaringen royal territory.
Ernst said, "Uncle Karl, the development of the Sigmaringen royal territory is indeed quite unexpected. If the Berlin Conference had not divided the colonial structure of West Africa in advance, perhaps Sigmaringen could have replicated the glory of our Hechingen royal family in East and South Africa. However, you entered Africa too late. If you had entered Africa a dozen years earlier, I believe you would have been stronger than East Africa is now."
Ernst naturally had a basis for what he said. At that time, the royal family of Sigmaringen was much stronger than the royal family of Hechingen. Sigmaringen itself was much larger than Hechingen and had a developed economy. Later, Sigmaringen seized control of Romania with the help of Napoleon III and almost became the new master of Spain.
Therefore, if Sigmaringen had developed colonies in Africa more than ten years earlier, the colonies would not necessarily have been worse than those in East Africa. Of course, theory is just theory. Ernst's greatest wealth actually came from his experience and knowledge in his previous life. Without these as a foundation, East Africa would not have been able to develop so fast. Just the way malaria is transmitted would have caused big trouble if Ernst had not mentioned it.
Prince Carl said, "Well, it looks great, but the transportation to the Sigmaringen Royal Territory is a major flaw. Chad is located in the interior of Africa, too far from the seaport, and much of the territory is actually a desert. If it weren't large enough and Lake Chad didn't provide sufficient water, perhaps Chad wouldn't even be as good as the colonies of Belgium or Italy in Africa."
Ernst looked down on Chad from the perspective of the environment, but it depends on who you compare it with. The natural conditions in the southwest region of the Italian Red Sea colony are indeed good, but other areas are mostly deserts. As for the Belgian Congo, it is mainly green desert and tropical rainforest climate.
Of course, these two places crush the Sigmaringen royal territory simply by having a port. Of course, with the support of the Northern Railway, the gap in transportation between the two sides is not obvious. For example, the Belgian Port of Pointe Noire has good natural conditions, but its development level is extremely low.
Italy is better in this regard, because Italy is a country with an overflow population, and with a population there is a certain economic support. Therefore, Italy's Red Sea colonies are actually being developed quite well, especially in the past few years of the armistice with the Abyssinian Empire, and have achieved rapid development.
The Kingdom of Italy has invested far more in the construction of the Red Sea colonies than in previous lives, and it truly treats it as local construction. If the Red Sea colonies become independent in the future, it should be considered a country of considerable size in Africa.
The current number of Italians in the Red Sea colonies is estimated to be between 700,000 and 800,000, which is about the same as the Sigmaringen royal territory, greatly easing the social contradictions in the Italian Kingdom.
Ernst: "The most important thing Sigmaringen should do now is to actively establish contact with Germany's Cameroon colony. However, the Cameroon colony is only in the coastal area. It is estimated that it will be very difficult for the two to communicate with each other."
The Cameroon colony was Sigmaringen's fastest way to gain access to the sea, and its biggest advantage was that Cameroon was a German colony. Today, the three royal families of Hechingen, Sigmaringen and Prussia have actually achieved good results in their respective fields.
The Hechingen royal family established the East African Kingdom, dominated southern Africa, and secured its position as a great power after the South African War. Sigmaringen controlled Romania and the Sigmaringen royal territory, with a land area of more than one million square kilometers and a ruled population of one million.
At this time, the Hohenzollern family was unprecedentedly powerful, and culturally, everyone was German. Of course, Sigmaringen was a little special. Romania had its own history and national cultural characteristics, and the majority of the population in the Sigmaringen royal territory was also Chinese.
However, in these two regions, Romanians have a good impression of Germany, while the Sigmaringen royal territory is completely dominated by German culture.
However, the German population in Sigmaringen was so small that Prince Karl had to go to Svet Palace to complain to Ernst.
Of course, Ernst himself did not care about this, because he positioned the Sigmaringen Kingdom as a population buffer zone. It did not matter whether the inhabitants were white or Chinese, as long as they were not black or green, all would be acceptable.
Ernst had been too deeply impressed by the European refugee crisis and the problem of racism in the United States in his previous life. So for the future development of East Africa, it would be better to take the initiative and establish a population reservoir around East Africa.
This is also an important reason why Ernst could tolerate and even support Italy and Belgium's colonies in northern East Africa. If there were no countries colonizing in northern East Africa, Ernst would have conquered the surrounding areas himself, and then launched a feudal system to establish a non-black and green country to cut off the direct connection between North Africa, West Africa and East Africa.
Moreover, letting Italy and Belgium do this can also maximize efficiency. Although the two countries are not large, their populations are not small.
There are a lot of undeveloped areas in East Africa itself, and it is simply unable to expand into West Africa and North Africa. Moreover, territorial expansion into these two places will easily provoke hostility from the international community.
Take Tsarist Russia for example. A large area of permafrost and extreme cold regions in the east were not effectively developed in the 19th century. If this part is removed, the core area of Europe is only a few million square kilometers. Moreover, the land conditions in the European part of Tsarist Russia are not very good. There is also the risk of independence in regions such as Ukraine and Poland.
If we really compare the effective territories, the United States and East Africa are definitely more hated than Tsarist Russia. This can be seen from the development and population migration of East Africa. It can be said that except for Southwest Africa, other regions in East Africa have conditions for agricultural development. Even in the Congo Basin, most areas are suitable for agricultural cultivation. It’s just that there are too many high-quality lands in East Africa, and there is no need to develop areas with poor conditions.
(End of this chapter)
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