"Industrialization of agricultural production? We've never heard of this before, so please advise Your Highness. Faced with a completely new phrase that interested everyone, Count Ludwig immediately asked.

Jochen turned his head to look at his father, because of the laryngeal surgery, Crown Prince Frederick now rarely spoke at length for the sake of recuperation and recovery, so he nodded to Jochen. Jochen turned around and began to explain to the Junker aristocracy present: "The industrialization of agricultural production can also be called industrial agriculture. The Junkers now concentrate their production on a small piece of land in their hands, and their inputs and outputs are only stored on their own small piece of land. The biggest feature of industrialization is clustering and industrialization. Once your production is clustered and scaled up, the cost you need to pay will be reduced accordingly. For example, the lords of the estates, where all the land is connected to each other, pool all the land together to produce a crop, and then pool all your funds together to buy machinery for agricultural production, and replace manpower with machinery, and you only need to buy the machinery once and use it for a long time; Buy fertilizers, pesticides, and seeds in large quantities to drive down the purchase price; Uniformly hire workers to engage in the production of all land, and then give them higher wages, and give bonuses according to the results of their labor, although the labor cost of a single person has increased, but with the help of machinery, the number of people you need is reduced, so the labor cost will not change too much, and with the support of high wages and high bonuses, it can also mobilize their production enthusiasm, so you don't have to worry about their production efficiency. So these people went from peasants to workers in agricultural production, and you went from landlords to industrial farmers. And your income is obtained through the proportion of the land and capital that guò paid at the beginning. Although the upfront investment will be large, the cost you will pay in the long run will be much smaller. In addition, relatively poor land can also be cultivated in rotation, fallow, land cultivation and other methods to improve the value of soil. Of course, these are just some of the methods used to solve the problem of local German agricultural production, and they are not the fundamental purpose of Jochen.

"We've never heard of His Highness's statement, but it does sound very attractive."

"The most fundamental core of industrialization is cheap and mass-produced. And if you only bury your head in your own small piece of land, you will never be able to produce it cheaply and mass-produced. ”

"Your Highness is taught."

"But that's not the solution to your bottom line." Jochen changed his words and said, "The Krupp family used to be Junkers, but now they are in industry and have wealth that you can't match. Germany is not rich in arable land, so even if you use industrial production, how much more profitable would you be than you are now? Again, large-scale, clustered, but the area of arable land in Germany limits the scale and clustering that you can do. Are you willing to watch those who have devoted themselves to industrialization have the same wealth and interests as you, or even less than your fellows, and live on such a small profit? ”

"Of course we don't want to, but we've lived on the land all our lives, and now we don't know anything about getting involved in the industrial field. Your Highness, what can we do? "There were always some of these Junkers who were ambitious, and many of the young Junkers complained.

Seeing that someone responded, Yoheng smiled, it is a good thing to be ambitious, and he did not sell it, and continued: "Actually, it is very simple, you have two choices, the first is to do the production, processing and sales chain, that is, you are not only engaged in the production of crops, and then sell them directly, but you work together to set up processing plants and sales channels, and then sell your output after processing. Originally, the output of a single estate could not meet the quantity required for this post-processing, but if you unify the crops of the estate and concentrate the products produced, then you can complete the subsequent processing process by yourself, so that on the one hand, the value of the processed products is definitely higher than that of the unprocessed crops; Second, since the processing plant is located near your estate, you can reduce the transportation link and reduce the freight. If you sell it yourself, then you form an industrial chain. If you reduce the profits lost by others in the two links of processing and sales, you will get more, and the profits will be distributed according to the proportion of your capital contribution to the amount of shares. If you are worried that you may not be able to do it yourself, then find someone to cooperate, and the processing plant will also need transportation costs and labor costs to buy crops from your estate. When the output of your estate can meet the needs of a processing plant, they have no reason to refuse to open a branch factory near your estate, then you can concentrate your funds, and then take a sufficient share of the newly opened factory, and then take dividends, the same way, sales can also find people to cooperate, because the processing cost is low, then the cost of sales will also be reduced, so find a seller to become a long-term partner, let them enjoy the preferential purchase price, then, With greater profit margins, they naturally want to make enough returns to you. Compared with the former, this method is more secure, although it gives up some benefits. The choice is yours. Jochen paused slightly, allowing the men to digest what they had said. This method is mainly to concentrate the idle funds in the hands of these agricultural Junkers into the development of light industry, which can promote the transformation of these agricultural Junkers into industrial Junkers, and the development of light industry, the people's living materials will be more abundant, and the number of light industry will increase, the supply of products in the market is sufficient, competition and supply and demand will make the price fall, as long as the balance can be controlled, it will greatly improve the people's living standards.

The Junker nobles present are not stupid, the benefits of large-scale production and industrial chain are self-evident, although there are still some doubts about the specific implementation, but they can basically understand and accept this line of thinking, so they asked: "Your Highness, then what is the second option?" ”

"The first option, whether you are riskier to go it alone or more prudently to find someone to work with, is actually still limited to the empire itself, and your profits in terms of cost and profit margin are increased, but the improvement is still limited, and you are ultimately limited by the amount of your agricultural output. The second option can greatly increase the amount of output you can produce, but it is very risky and difficult, and I don't think many of you here can endure this kind of suffering. "Jochen is coming.

"Many of me have been soldiers and fought in wars, and they are not even afraid of death, so what are they afraid of! Your Highness, are you underestimating the courage and tradition of our Junker aristocracy? Count Ludwig responded, and everyone responded to the count's words, which for a time were full of rhetoric about courage and tradition.

Seeing that everyone was so "courageous", he smiled and said: "You are worthy of being the cornerstone of the empire, and your enthusiasm and courage are admirable. In fact, this second option is actually very simple, the lack of domestic land limits the output of crops, isn't it okay to find land abroad? ”

As soon as these words came out, the nobles who had just been arrogant were silent. In the end, it was Count Ludwig who spoke: "Your Highness, you mean the colony?" ”

"Yes, I don't dare to pack a ticket elsewhere, but now German Cameroon is in a good state of development, and after such a long period of hydrological and geological exploration, it has come to the conclusion that Cameroon has at least 50,000 square kilometers of land suitable for agricultural production (Note 1), and the empire has been acquiring land in Cameroon, and by the end of 1887, the Governor's Office of Cameroon reported that the land we have in our hands suitable for cultivation is close to 5,000 square kilometers, and this is still because of insufficient investment, Land is not highly utilized. If you go to the colony, you will enjoy a lot of benefits from the Empire, such as land purchase price discounts, agricultural tax incentives, subsidies for food production, and don't forget, the Empire's grain import duties have also been reduced, which is also beneficial to the producers in the colony. If there is more investment in the colonies, the empire will naturally buy more land, and even if you don't have the land, you can work with local landowners, and I believe that the cost of cooperating with them is much lower than at home. And the labor cost of the colony is also low, so you don't have to worry about manpower by hiring locals to farm. And you can also realize the industrial chain in the colony, and sell the processed products to the country, and these finished products can also be sold to the locals, and the marks you pay for them can be earned back. Isn't that better than the limited land you are guarding the country? "This program can not only allow the Junkers to go to the colonies to cultivate and solve the food problem in Germany, but also such large-scale cultivation and planting, naturally bring huge business opportunities, supporting fertilizers, pesticides, production tools and even agricultural machinery will appear in the colonies, which will bring huge capital flows, not only to stimulate domestic finance, but also to allow the colonies to obtain the most important capital for rapid development, and the higher the investment, the faster the colony will develop, the greater the recovery of costs and the greater the profits that begin to bring to the empire.

"Your Highness is right, but the environment in Africa is harsh, with a hot climate, terrible diseases, bad transportation, and dangerous natives, it is impossible for the nobles to go there, and the initial investment is very high, and the effect will be very slow......"

"If the form of development of the colony is good, these problems are not big, there are more Germans in the colony, it is natural to build hospitals, the colony can have a huge output, it is natural to build roads, and the greater the interests of the empire in the colony, the greater the army, the real question is, whether anyone is willing to go to the colony and carve out a world of their own. If you really don't want to go to the colonies to suffer, then find people who are willing to suffer as partners, as long as they are willing to give up some of their interests. But if you don't even want to find a partner to take the risk of investment. That can't be helped, just let them watch others get rich. Jochen said lightly.

"What His Highness said today is refreshing to us, but we still need time to discuss how to do it."

"Of course, after all, it is a huge change that has changed your previous mode of production, and the empire also has to make all kinds of relevant policy adjustments and formulations. Of course, I hope that tradition and courage can allow our aristocrats to break into a wider world. The Empire's future policies on agricultural production and grain imports will be formulated around the promotion of industrial development. Therefore, if you do not change the mode of production or the scale of production, you will indeed face some difficulties in the future, and the empire is certainly not willing to let our nobles face such difficulties, so the opportunity is given to you, and it is up to you whether you can seize it or not. Jochen's words were flat, but every word hit the hearts of the Junkers like a hammer. The Empire's determination to develop industry will not waver, and any obstacle will be kicked away. If you don't seize the opportunity given by the empire now, you won't have a chance again. The words conveyed by His Highness Joachim are the will of Crown Prince Frederick, the will of the future emperor of the empire. This realization made everyone very nervous.

"We understand what Your Highness means, and we are naturally willing to contribute to the development of the empire. We will discuss and consult when we get back. ”

"The Empire will appreciate your contributions, and I sincerely hope that all of you here will have a better future as the Empire grows." Crown Prince Frederick, who had not spoken, made his final speech.

In a wave of words of gratitude, oath, and praise, the meeting ended successfully. And with the support of these people, the future agricultural and colonial policies of the empire will be unimpeded.

Note 1: Cameroon now accounts for 18% of the country's arable land alone, with a total area of more than 70,000 square kilometers.