Chapter 881 Feasibility of Cash Crops Mechanization
Regarding Angolan agriculture, the main task of the East African government before was to restore the production of local plantations and farms. Now this goal has been achieved. After the Portuguese withdrew, East Africa completed the restoration of local agricultural order in four years.
What followed was the resolution of social security issues. To put it bluntly, the black slaves who had fled to various parts of Angola during the war were recaptured and put to work in plantations and farms.
While resuming production, East Africa will also simultaneously restore Angola's original commodity export market. Otherwise, if the agricultural products are produced but have nowhere to go, the East African government's work would be in vain.
East Africa's response strategy is to advance the domestic and foreign markets simultaneously. One is to restore the original Portuguese commodity sales channels in Angola. However, due to the relationship between the two countries, there has been little progress in this regard.
Therefore, East Africa urgently needs to develop new shipping markets, and this naturally falls on Germany. On the ocean route, the west coast of East Africa is the fastest way to reach Germany.
Originally, the East African port was in the east, so direct maritime trade between East Africa and Germany had to go through the Strait of Gibraltar, or it could only be circulated through the Austro-Hungarian Railway.
With the increase of ports on the west coast, East African ships can go directly to Atlantic ports such as Bremen and Hamburg in Germany, or enter the Baltic ports through the Skagerrak or the future Kiel Canal in Germany.
At this time, the Kiel Canal had not yet been opened. The construction of the Kiel Canal had begun before the South African War in 1887. According to the current progress of the project, the opening of the Kiel Canal would have to wait until at least next year, that is, 1885.
In addition to rebuilding the international market, building the domestic market is also an important way for Angola to get out of its predicament. After the construction of the two north-south railways in Benguela and Luanda is completed, central East Africa and Angola have been connected.
This is also a case of mutual benefit and win-win, which means that industrial and agricultural products in the central region can not only be exported to the sea from the eastern part of East Africa, but also from the western ports.
Taking Lubumbashi, the capital of Swabia Province, as an example, its straight-line distance to the eastern and western seaports is about 1,400 kilometers. At this time, whether to choose the eastern or western seaport depends mainly on the location of the product export market. For example, if it is the Austro-Hungarian Empire, then it is naturally more cost-effective to go out to sea from the east. If it is Germany, then it is more cost-effective to go out to sea from the west.
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"As for Angolan agriculture, the Portuguese have put more thought into it, but our resources are mainly concentrated in Mozambique, and most of them are based on farm economy, while Angola is mainly based on plantation economy," said Goldstein.
The current plantation economy requires a large amount of labor, which is true in any region dominated by a plantation economy, while the farm economy can quickly reduce costs through mechanization.
Plantation agriculture involves a wide range of plant resources, such as natural rubber, coffee, cocoa, tea, banana, pineapple, mango, oil palm, sisal, tobacco, cotton and jute, and most of these cannot be mechanized, or cannot be currently realized.
In East Africa, farms mainly grow food crops, supplemented by livestock breeding and vegetable planting. Food crops, especially cereal agricultural mechanization, have already taken shape in developed areas.
For example, a series of machines such as tractors, seed drills, tillers, harvesters, planters, balers, mowers, and transporters have almost all been invented.
Currently, European and American countries, like East Africa, are vigorously promoting agricultural mechanization. However, this is a long process. In the past, it was not until around World War II that developed countries in Europe and the United States achieved overall agricultural mechanization.
This is also the general direction of current agricultural reform in East Africa. Therefore, Mozambique, which is mainly plain terrain and has excellent water and heat conditions, was selected by East Africa as a key experimental area.
Tropical cash crops such as rubber, sugarcane, and cotton can only rely on manpower at present. Like other countries, East Africa also uses a large number of black slaves as cheap labor. In addition, the current cash crops are highly profitable, so they have become the main source of income for East African agriculture.
Angola's agricultural model is mainly based on tropical plantations, and the proportion of agriculture such as food and fisheries is significantly lower than that of tropical plantations.
In response to this, Goldstein said, "At present, our tropical cash crop planting industry still relies heavily on cheap indigenous 'laborers' as the main source of power. This is obviously inconsistent with our national policy of eliminating black labor in the next 20 years. Therefore, our Ministry of Agriculture believes that for some cash crops that can be planted and harvested mechanically, we will strongly support scientific research institutions to improve agricultural tools and reduce dependence on cheap labor."
The tropical cash crops that Goldstein mentioned are mainly non-woody plant crops, such as rubber, fruit trees, tea, etc. Even in the 21st century, large-scale mechanized operations have not been achieved. However, cotton, sugarcane, etc. are feasible, mainly in terms of harvesting.
Of course, East Africa does not have a good solution for rubber and fruit trees. It can only maintain the status quo, but it can achieve cost reduction in some links.
For example, through the construction of railways and roads, transportation costs can be reduced. Although large-scale mechanized harvesting cannot be achieved, small modern agricultural machinery can be developed to facilitate plantation workers to complete harvesting, pruning and other work processes.
Another important reason for the low mechanization rate of cash crops in the world is that developed countries such as Europe and the United States are not major cash crop growers themselves. For example, the United States mainly controls neighboring countries along the Caribbean coast to complete the production of cash crops to meet its own needs.
Countries such as Britain and France can reduce production costs by taking advantage of cheap labor costs in their colonies in South Asia, Southeast Asia or West Africa.
The labor cost in this current economic colony is extremely low, which further increases the research and development and promotion of mechanization in tropical cash crops.
There is no doubt that the only country that can make a difference in this field is East Africa, which has the ability and demand to promote the mechanization of tropical cash crops.
First of all, East Africa is an independent sovereign country and can independently formulate its own strategic development direction. This is the biggest advantage that the colonies of European and American countries do not have.
Secondly, East Africa has huge advantages in science and technology compared with its peers. East Africa's competitors are generally backward countries and colonies with extremely backward technological levels.
Finally, East Africa needs to promote the mechanization of tropical cash crops. East Africa itself is the largest country in tropical cash crop cultivation, far exceeding countries such as Brazil. Secondly, East Africa cannot always rely on black slaves to ensure its competitiveness in this field. Black slaves will inevitably be replaced by East African citizens in the future.
East Africa also has ambitions, which is to become the manipulator of the world's tropical cash crop industry in the future, just like the United States in the world's commodity grain agriculture field.
In order to achieve this goal, it is necessary to gain all-round advantages in this field and defeat other competitors. After losing the price advantage of black slaves, East Africa can only work hard in the field of science and technology to achieve this goal.
Therefore, the reality requires East Africa to increase investment in this field. Otherwise, given the climate conditions in East Africa, it will be very difficult to compete with European and American countries in the traditional agricultural field.
Of course, if East Africa is allowed to complete the mechanization of most tropical cash crops, countries such as Brazil and Southeast Asia will have a hard time in the future. However, this is not a problem for East Africa to worry about. Even if it does not crush these countries through technological means, East Africa is currently the world's largest and most powerful country in the tropical cash crop planting industry.
However, considering the hard work and difficulty of mechanization in tropical cash crop cultivation, if East Africa does not make efforts in this area, the agricultural economy in the future will remain a labor-intensive industry as in the past.
It is impossible for East Africa to continue to rely on labor-intensive industries in the future, which is not in line with East Africa’s current national strength, status and ambitions.
(End of this chapter)
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