Chapter 172: Expansion and the Immigration Issue
At present, East Africa is developing rapidly. Although this is the age of industrialization, East Africa is almost entirely undeveloped in terms of industrialization.
However, East Africa's inherent conditions were never very favorable. Especially before the colonial development, the vast majority of the local areas were still in a primitive hunting stage of civilization. The vast land remained undeveloped and unused. The only area that could be considered a modern state, the Sultanate of Zanzibar, was primarily reliant on the slave trade on the mainland part.
For East Africa to be brought into an agricultural society by the colonial government was already an impressive accomplishment.
Agriculture is the foundation of East Africa. Even in a previous life, East Africa was one of the few agriculturally stable regions in Africa, generally achieving self-sufficiency. Tanzania and the countries around the Great Lakes region are important agricultural nations in Africa.
Of course, if given the choice, East African nations would prefer to be resource-rich rather than solely agricultural. However, looking at the previous development of East Africa, the region is among the more economically underdeveloped in Africa.
This is because East Africa lacks significant natural resource endowments. Within Africa, it does not stand out. Of course, this also brings some advantages: compared to other parts of Africa, East Africa experienced fewer conflicts and wars and had a relatively stable society.
However, "not outstanding" does not mean "completely lacking resources." What East Africa lacks are the major mineral resources needed for industrialization—coal, iron, oil, etc.—minerals that are in high demand and are the foundation of industrial development.
For example, in the previous life, Africa was world-famous for diamonds, which had the highest production. However, as luxury goods driven by speculation, diamonds contributed little to Africa's industrialization. Their profits were largely extracted by Western capitalists.
In terms of coal and iron, the African continent as a whole has relatively low reserves compared to other continents. Oil resources are better, but mainly located in North Africa and along the West African coast.
Africa is considered rich in resources largely because its development level is low, and resource utilization is poor. Mining remains a pillar industry in many countries.
With technological development, especially since the 21st century, the demand for non-ferrous metals—including heavy metals (like copper, lead, zinc), light metals (like aluminum, magnesium), precious metals (like gold, silver, platinum), and rare metals (like tungsten, molybdenum, germanium, lithium, lanthanum, uranium)—has grown significantly. Particularly rare metals have seen a rise in research and development. These are relatively abundant in Africa.
However, in terms of importance, oil, coal, iron, copper, aluminum, and gold remain irreplaceable.
Especially in the field of energy—so many wars are fought over energy. Many nations have been shattered fighting for it.
As for oil, East Africa can forget about it. After thoroughly searching nearby, only South Sudan has considerable reserves. However, Constantin has no intention of sparking conflict with Egypt. Any country with some degree of power deserves respect.
Coal, however, may be worth pursuing. While East Africa's coal reserves are limited, southern Africa has abundant coal resources, especially in Zambia and Zimbabwe. These areas currently fall under "unclaimed" territory.
Constantin has long set his sights on Zambia, and he's never stopped thinking about the Katanga Plateau copper belt (Central African copper-cobalt belt).
It is the most accessible world-class metallic mineral belt for East Africa and can directly influence global copper pricing power.
With the northwest of the Great Lakes region and northern Kenya already secured, East Africa's main expansion in 1869 is undoubtedly the Katanga Plateau.
This time, East Africa maintains its consistent expansion strategy—avoiding conflict with regional powers and other colonial players, steering clear of their core interests, namely Egypt, Britain, and Portugal.
Currently, there are vast buffer zones between East Africa and these nations or their colonies, preventing direct contact between the powers.
To the south lies Portuguese Mozambique, and to the north, Egypt and British Somaliland. These areas are separated from East Africa by either terrain or indigenous peoples.
This ensures that the next phase of East Africa's expansion can only move westward.
Directly to the west lies the Congo, but Constantin has little interest in tropical rainforests.
There's also nothing in the northwest that particularly attracts East African expansion.
That leaves the southwest. First, the Katanga Plateau must be secured. Then, preparations can be made to develop future energy reserves (coal).
This sums up East Africa's current resource situation, its geopolitical surroundings, and the 1869 expansion plan.
In 1869, the immigration target for East Africa is a population surpassing two million.
That's right—Constantin's current requirement is that modest. East Africa's population already exceeds 1.75 million, so surpassing two million should be easy—perhaps even achievable through natural population growth alone.
Two million is a critical threshold. Once it's crossed, Constantin won't need to worry so much about East Africa's security like he did before.
Moving forward, immigration operations in East Africa can proceed as usual. It's likely there won't be significant fluctuations again.
Future shipping vessels and transport capacity of the Hechingen Consortium will no longer be directed toward immigration but rather toward industrial transfer and cargo shipping.
This change also means that East Africa will raise—not lower—its immigrant screening standards. In the past, due to the urgent need for people, standards inevitably dropped. Now, requirements will increase.
That said, the speed of immigration to East Africa probably won't change much. Since the second half of 1868, immigration has entered a slower phase.
Political stability and peace in the Far East and German regions have sharply reduced the willingness of common people to emigrate. On top of that, East Africa's aggressive past efforts drained the immigration potential of those areas, which now need time to recover.
As a result, East Africa currently has some excess immigration capacity. Fortunately, newly introduced Slavs have helped fill the gap. Still, overall immigration is slowing.
Of course, East Africa still welcomes immigrants from the German regions. But there really are none left.
With the decline in German immigration, Constantin plans to restrict the numbers from other groups.
German immigrants must make up at least 30% of the total. Other European immigrants should be around 20%, the Far East about 30%, and others (Middle East, Southeast Asia, the Americas) no more than 20%.
This way, although there are many Chinese immigrants, European and other immigrants are even more numerous, with Germans being the dominant group among them.
Moreover, intermarriage among immigrants across various regions in the colony has created a relatively stable population structure. The next step is to continue promoting Germanization.
This is also one of the key reasons Constantin is no longer chasing immigration numbers.
Every immigrant group must be counterbalanced by a certain number of German immigrants.
Now that German immigration is declining, the numbers from other groups must also be reduced—or new sources found—to prevent any single group from becoming too dominant.
As a German himself, Constantin must ensure that German culture and thought dominate in East Africa—especially in the early stages of colonization.
Moreover, Constantin must now prepare for the Franco-Prussian War.
It is a crucial opportunity. Constantin must seize it to elevate the Hechingen Consortium to new heights.
The opening of the Suez Canal this year will also have a profound impact on East Africa.
Constantin is sure to make some adjustments to the colony in response, meaning immigration issues will become less important this year.
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