Chapter 924 Ocean
East Africa’s actions in Mindanao showed East Africa’s determination to explore the ocean. Correspondingly, in 1897, 27 large-scale shipbuilding companies were established in East Africa. With the expansion of territory, The number of available ports in East Africa has also increased significantly. These ports are both native and overseas colonies. The native ports are mainly in the south and west.
At the same time, territorial expansion, along with the expansion of East Africa's inland waterway shipping mileage, has also seen rapid growth in inland water transport ports. Especially under East Africa's ambitious "East Africa Grand Canal" plan, the inland shipping industry has broader prospects.
At the same time, overseas territories such as Lanfang Overseas Province, Southern Ryukyu Islands, Northern Hawaiian Kingdom, Balabac Island, and Mindanao also provide a large number of excellent ports for the East African ocean strategy.
With the annexation of East Africa to Mindanao, Balabac Island’s important role has also been reflected. It connects the Mindanao colony and the Lanfang Overseas Province.
"At present, a total of 25 key ports have been identified and put into construction in our country. They are concentrated in the east and there are fewer ports in the west. However, each developed port has good conditions. The cities where these 25 ports are located basically correspond to the coastal areas. The regional economy is relatively developed," Ernst said to the government personnel.
Although the coastline of East Africa is relatively straight and lacks excellent seaports, the number of seaports that have been built and developed in East Africa currently exceeds 40. These more than 40 ports are basically responsible for East Africa’s national foreign trade. , and the more important 25 of them are the ones that East Africa attaches most importance to.
In contrast, there are inland water transport ports. The number of inland water ports in East Africa has exceeded 200. The difference between the two is significant, and with the development of the inland economy, this gap will further widen. big.
There are more than 60 ports in the Great Lakes region alone, mainly distributed along the Great Lake (Lake Victoria) and the rivers that flow into the Great Lakes.
The second is the Lake Malawi Basin and Lake Solon (Lake Tanganyika). These three regions are the most developed areas of the inland waterway shipping industry in East Africa. Together they account for 100% of the inland waterway shipping in East Africa. More than fifty points.
Of course, although the number of inland river ports far exceeds that of sea ports, the value between the two is obviously unequal. It is not even an exaggeration to say that the importance of one external liaison sea port is more important than ten inland river ports.
“Currently, our country’s development and utilization of the ocean clearly lags behind other countries in the world. Not to mention compared with those large territorial countries, even Germany’s number of seaports exceeds ours. Although its maritime ports are mainly Mainly small and medium-sized ports in the Baltic Sea”
The same countries include Tsarist Russia and the Austro-Hungarian Empire. The Austro-Hungarian Empire is not like its previous life. It now sits on the Adriatic coast such as Venice and Trieste, but it is also restricted by the Adriatic Sea. the performance of its navy.
Not to mention Tsarist Russia. The Baltic Sea and the Black Sea are its main economic areas, and both of them are restricted. Although the Pacific and Arctic Oceans have ports, neither area is suitable for economic activities. Among them, Murmansk is known as a non-freezing port all year round, but it is not an economically active area in Russia. Like Vladivostok, its military use is more prominent.
Of course, apart from these three unlucky guys, the shipping conditions of other world powers, at least in terms of the number of seaports, are only inferior to those of Brazil and the Far Eastern Empire in East Africa.
The Far Eastern Empire mainly opened the sea for too short a time, and even under the threat of powerful ships and artillery from the great powers, it opened up some areas as treaty ports. However, Brazil's economic development was completely too poor, and the regional Caused by uneven development.
From this point of view, the number of seaports in East Africa is insufficient compared with the previous ones, but more than the lower ones. With the limited number of seaports and the increasingly frequent overseas trade in East Africa, the East African government naturally attaches great importance to the available ports. Unprecedented.
“Faced with increasingly fierce maritime competition, East Africa cannot only develop inland without paying attention to port construction. Except for some special-purpose ports, the number of commercial ports should exceed at least one hundred, so as to better promote Coastal economic development and relief of pressure on existing ports. "Special-purpose ports mainly refer to military ports. In this regard, East Africa takes great care of the navy and basically reserves the best port areas in various major sea areas for use as naval bases. .
The goal of exceeding 100 seaports is somewhat difficult, but it is not impossible to achieve because there are still a large number of unexploited bays in East Africa, especially in the eastern Mozambique region.
In the past, these African countries had few seaports, mainly because they lacked economic strength and lacked the ability to develop and utilize these bays or river estuaries.
Of course, the country's inactive foreign trade is also an important factor. In the past, the economic level of African countries was that the existing ports were fully sufficient, so the local governments were not keen on building new ports, or they were interested because of knowledge, war, etc. Powerless.
The most typical example is that the Eastern powers help these African countries build infrastructure such as ports and highways. If it were not for the rise of emerging powers, Africa would not even have a chance.
Under the rule of East Africa, this situation will naturally not occur. East Africa itself is one of the "infrastructure madmen" of this era, so the East African government is more attentive to the construction of seaports.
"In addition to local maritime navigation construction, there should also be breakthroughs in the construction of colonial ports, of which Pontianak, Zamboanga and Davao are the focus."
As for other colonies, they are mainly reflected in their strategic value In terms of economic value, it is difficult to compete with the above three ports. Although the resources of Lanfang Overseas Province are worse, the area is not small, and Mindanao has basically no shortcomings except climate and population.
Others, such as the Southern Ryukyu Islands, the Northern Kingdom of Hawaii, etc., are too small. Some islands in the Southern Ryukyu Islands even have water sources. Therefore, these colonies can barely be used as naval bases. As for the economic prospects, there is not much potential.
The Alaska colony was an accident. Although the area, resources, and population are not small, East Africa currently does not have the strength to develop Alaska. After all, after all the hard work and vigorous development, the peaches were picked by surrounding forces. Big loss.
Alaska is surrounded by wolves. Canada, the United States, Tsarist Russia, and Japan all have this strength. Similarly, the Southern Ryukyu Islands and the Northern Hawaiian Kingdom also have this possibility, so for these three areas , the main strategy of the East African government is still to focus on stability. As long as the stability of local governance can be guaranteed, long-term development will be possible in the future.
"Of course, port construction is equivalent to road construction, and it is impossible without vehicles. Compared with other major countries in the world, our country's shipbuilding industry is far behind, so vigorously promoting the development of the shipbuilding industry is the key to the next ten to twenty years. , one of the important tasks of the government and enterprises. ”
“The shipbuilding industry is one of the main heavy industry sectors in the world, involving metallurgy, machinery, electrical, chemical. Various fields such as science and technology can effectively promote the development of related industries, so investment in the shipbuilding industry is very important, especially the training of relevant personnel is a long-term process.”
For what Ernst said, East Africa is very important. Many government officials are also very clear that the development of the shipbuilding industry cannot be separated from the support of personnel and technology. After all, the project volume is huge, the process is complex, the investment is large, and the system is focused.
The shipbuilding industry has been a veritable pearl of industry since the Age of Discovery. If East Africa wants to compete with other countries in the ocean, it is naturally inseparable from the great development of the local shipbuilding industry.
(End of this chapter)