The city of Mombasa was generally left with a good impression on the Austrian business delegation, and the most important thing for overseas investment is stability, and East Africa is better than stability. Although the mission considered the use of blacks in East Africa to be somewhat conservative, East Africa itself was large enough for them to invest here.

At present, the head of the delegation, Wolfgang, himself plans to invest in a few small factories in East Africa to test the waters, and the other members basically think the same way. Because they are still skeptical of East African politics, the typical feudal monarchy and ultra-conservative style of East Africa have made them a little worried about the business environment in East Africa.

……

When Wolfgang and others were in the north, the eastern part of Lake Malawi in the south, which had been left to Austria for development, was not taken care of.

First of all, the location is too remote, deep in the interior of East Africa, although the northern industrial zone is planned to the Great Lakes region, but Mombasa has the unique advantages of this port, which is incomparable with the surrounding Lake Malawi, and the scale of the only Mtwara port in the south cannot be compared with Mombasa.

The transportation situation in East Africa shows that the products produced in the region are difficult to transport by sea, and can only rely on the procurement of the East African government, that is to say, it is completely dependent on the East African domestic market to digest, and the uncertainty is too strong.

Secondly, it has been proved that the coal and iron resources here cannot impress the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and it is not very attractive to investors, after all, the Balkan Peninsula is on the side, and there is no need to cross the ocean to East Africa to develop.

Finally, the positioning of East Africa near Lake Malawi is the development of heavy industry, which is also contrary to the idea of the Austrians, as we all know, light industry has the characteristics of small investment, short cycle, and fast return on investment, which is incomparable to heavy industry, so capital prefers to invest in light industry.

Therefore, the development of industry near Lake Malawi can only be developed by East Africa itself, and the Hexingen Consortium has basically zero experience in this area, although there are related industries in East Africa, but they are all at the stage of handicrafts.

Only the city of Mbeya has reached the level of some small-scale coal mining in Europe, and with the replacement of related equipment, production is steadily increasing.

In the field of heavy industry, not to mention East Africa, even the European part of the Hexingen consortium, which does not have much experience in this regard, at this time can only complete the investment in the local area by throwing money.

Fortunately, the Heixingen consortium was now well banked, and it was a windfall just to buy Franco-Prussian War bonds, so Ernst bought a small steel company in the Saarland and sent it to East Africa.

The steel company originally made its fortune from a small iron ore mine in the Saarland region, but the Franco-Prussian War broke out, interrupting the normal production order, breaking the capital chain, and finally going bankrupt.

Ernst took advantage of the situation to take over the small steel company, and at the same time extended an invitation to local workers who were temporarily unemployed at home, and in the end only about 100 employees, most of them Germans, were willing to leave the Saarland region for East Africa.

After a three-month turnaround, the workers were almost in place, and in order to improve the efficiency of the development of iron ore resources, ERNST simply purchased new production equipment directly from Austria.

At the same time, Ernst acquired a steel mill in Kapfenburg, Austria, and the two companies merged and changed their name to the United Iron and Steel Corporation of East Africa, giving East Africa's own steel industry a difficult start. The Heixingen Foundation also began to get involved in the field of heavy industrial production in the fields of scientific research, light industry, shipbuilding, and trade.

East Africa attaches great importance to the development of the area near the Lake Malawi region, which is the only region in Tanzania that has both coal and iron resources, and only with coal and iron can there be a foundation for industrialization.

Regarding the development of the Lake Malawi area, Ernst made a point of speaking with Konstantin.

Ernst: "The existence of heavy industry requires two conditions, one is the supply of raw materials, and the other is the support of sufficient national funds, which we already have in East Africa, and the Lake Malawi region is located in the hinterland of East Africa, and the environment is relatively safe, so there is not much problem with investment and development. ”

Although there is Mozambique in the south of the Lake Malawi region, it can be completely ignored for East Africa, if the Kingdom of Portugal itself East Africa may still pay attention to it, but that's all, the volume of East Africa has reached the level of Portugal itself, that is, the capital is relatively weak compared with Portugal, but the capital of the Portuguese is scattered in private hands, and East Africa is mostly concentrated in the hands of the government.

Konstantin: "It is now certain that the Austrians are not at all interested in investing in the Lake Malawi region, as was made clear in von der Leyen's telegram yesterday, and even in the Northern Industrial Zone, they are more inclined to invest in Mombasa, and have little interest in the interior, and if it were not for the tempting development plan for the city of Nairobi, I am afraid they would not be indifferent." ”

Ernst: "I have expected this, but it is not a big deal, the Lake Malawi industrial area is indeed congenitally insufficient, especially the transportation conditions in East Africa, so we can only rely on ourselves to support the development, and since they have invested in Mombasa, as long as we provide them with convenience and make more money, they will slowly increase their investment in the northern industrial belt driven by interests." ”

Konstantin: "What are your plans for the Lake Malawi area?" ”

Ernst: "The Malawi Lake Area is positioned as a heavy industry base, but it can only meet the initial industrial development needs of East Africa, and with the development of East Africa in the future, the heavy industry base of East Africa will definitely be transferred to the Matabele Plateau, so what we have to do in the Malawi Lake Area is to do a good job in talent training and technical reserves, laying the foundation for the future development of the Matabele Plateau, and at the same time, the Malawi Lake Area connects Tanganyika and Zambia, from here it is better to radiate the inland areas, strengthen the control of East Africa over the inland, and rely on the heavy industry of the Malawi Lake Area, After all, the coast is not a peaceful area, and it may be threatened by the sea at any time, and the strength of our East African Navy is not enough to deal with the enemy at sea, so the inland of East Africa must be developed, even if it is for security reasons. ”

As I said before, the East African Army can throw off the ten streets of the navy, and when it comes to the interior, the East African Army is not afraid of any challenge, but the situation on the sea is complicated, and the maritime power of Mozambique alone is not weaker than that of East Africa, not to mention Portugal, the maritime power behind it.

Ernst: "Steel production is the most intuitive embodiment of a country's comprehensive strength, East Africa can only be able to undertake more industries if it is self-sufficient in steel production, and the current difficulty in transferring the Hexingen consortium to East Africa lies in the lack of infrastructure and industry, if the Lake Malawi Industrial Zone is completed, I can transfer one-third of the consortium's industries to East Africa in at least three years." ”

Heavy industry provides the main means of production on the material and technological basis, while the products of the enterprises of the Heixingen consortium are developed on the basis of German and Austrian heavy industries, and the parts and technologies come from both. Only when East Africa solves this problem first can it undertake the industrial transfer of the Heixingen Foundation.

The current foundation of heavy industry is the steel industry, and only when steel production comes up can we have the ability to develop related industries.

Konstantin: "In the end, it's still a traffic problem, with transportation everything is more convenient, and the issue of railway construction should also be put on the agenda, I heard that the first railway is currently making slow progress, I don't know if it will succeed." ”

Ernst: "The main thing is that there is a lack of technical accumulation, Vienna Energy Power and Austria cooperate, but both of them do not have enough experience and technology in the field of broad-gauge locomotives, so now there is not even an experimental locomotive, I will reconsider this aspect, anyway, the first railway is an experimental railway, but it was overturned and rebuilt." ”

East Africa envisions that the broad-gauge locomotive cannot be built, but that it cannot be compared with other gauge standard locomotives, and there are many defects, and the first-mover advantage in technology is indeed not so easy to solve.

Ernst didn't intend to waste time on this, it was better to choose ready-made railway standards, at least to avoid a lot of detours, and the development of East Africa was not waiting for anyone.

However, this attempt can not be said to be fruitless, Vienna Energy Power Company has also explored a lot of new technologies in the cooperation with Austria, which can be applied to the East African Railway, and at the same time, Vienna Energy Power Company has a mature idea for locomotive research and development, and there is no technical problem in realizing the localization of East African Railway in the future.

At present, the advice of various Austrian railway companies to East Africa is to directly adopt mature railway standards, in this regard, they mainly promote 1435mm, followed by meter gauge, and even 760mm, etc., which are the railway gauge that existed in Austria-Hungary itself, and the technology is also mature.

There was no uniform standard for the railways in the Austro-Hungarian Empire, so the advice to Ernst was mixed, but the main thing was to recommend its own technology.

The 760mm ERNST is intended to be a narrow gauge suitable for mountainous and mining operations, which can be brought into the current mines in the Lake Malawi region to increase coal and iron ore shipments. However, the railway standards in East Africa are mainly selected at 1435mm and above.

In this regard, there are three main types of railway gauge that meet this standard in the previous life, 1435mm is the standard gauge, which is the most operating countries, 1524mm is mainly in Eastern Europe, Russia, Mongolia and other countries, and finally 1676mm, India, Argentina, Chile and other countries are implemented.

1676mm and 1524mm are not unified, for example, Portugal 1665mm, Spain's 1674mm are only slightly worse, and 1524mm also has 1520mm.

For example, some countries use an integer, which is 1000mm, and some use 1067mm.

There are also alternative 1600mm railways that exist in Brazil, Australia and Ireland.

With the above railways, the East African railway will not exist in isolation in the future, because there will always be countries with the same railway standards as East Africa.

The 2500mm railway gauge is too controversial, and now we are soliciting your suggestions and adopting, and the time is until July 24, 2023.

(End of chapter)