"Your Highness, we have integrated a total of 17 steel enterprises in Germany, including 3 large steel enterprises, and the rest are small and medium-sized steel enterprises, which are divided according to national categories, including 8 steel enterprises in Austria-Hungary, 7 in Germany, and 2 in Luxembourg."

Since 1870, Luxembourg has been mining a large number of iron ore in the country, and on the basis of the Thomas Steelmaking Law, the steel industry has been vigorously developed, and the two large steel companies acquired by East Africa are Luxembourg enterprises, and one large steel company is a Ruhr enterprise.

In 1873, Germany's industrial development reached an unprecedented peak. In just a few years, the number of steel mills has increased from 920 to 1,720, and pig iron production has doubled to 2 million tons, so the steel companies that ERNST has poached are a drop in the bucket for Germany.

During the economic crisis, a large number of steel companies in the whole German region went bankrupt, generally small and medium-sized enterprises, and large enterprises were more resistant to risks, which is why two of the large steel companies acquired by the Heixingen consortium were Luxembourg enterprises.

"By August, we had recruited more than 34,000 steelworkers from the Austro-Hungarian Empire to emigrate to East Africa, of which more than 13,000 were Czechs according to your request, and the rest were mostly Slovenes and Croats."

"Too little, still too little!" Ernst said with some dissatisfaction.

"Your Highness, the main reason is the lack of capacity, this year we have invested almost five percent of the number of merchant ships in the Americas, and twenty-five percent of the capacity has been invested in rail transportation. We don't have enough merchant ships of our own, and even with the Netherlands, the Kingdom of Naples still can't meet so many needs. ”

Ernst pondered for a moment: "Well, in this case, it seems that only one last resort can be used." ”

The so-called last resort, that is, to hire British merchant ships, is also a matter of no choice.

The Hexingen Ocean Trading Company is currently the largest shipping company in the world, with more than 1,000 large merchant ships, this is because the Hexingen Ocean Trading Company is said to be a private enterprise, in fact, it monopolizes the trade of the entire East Africa, and is involved in the trade of the Americas, Europe and the Far East at the same time.

At the beginning of the 19th century alone, the British Royal Navy had about 1,000 warships of various kinds, and now the number is a little less, because the British Royal Navy is in a state of rearmament, and the ironclad ships are launched every year, and there is no need to pile up wooden warships, but pay more attention to tonnage.

In the 19th century, Britain was a veritable ship empire, producing more than 80% of the world's ships and owning about half of the world's fleet.

East Africa would not have been able to take out all the belongings, and if it were not for the appearance of ironclad ships, the navies of the world would not even have a chance to challenge the British Navy.

Ernst then instructed: "However, when dealing with the British, not with the big companies, but with the small companies and even the self-employed, and at the same time looking all the coasts of the Mediterranean except the British, whatever the country, as long as the price is lower than that of the British, you can negotiate." ”

Shipping prices are generally the lowest in the UK, but in times of economic crisis, there are always exceptions.

The Heixingen Consortium's own fleet is a little worse in this regard, and some necessary positions cannot be replaced, but the ship's cleaners, cooks and other professions can be done by Chinese, and the main one is cheap.

"How are the steel orders going so far?" Ernst asked.

"We negotiated with the Austrian government a business of 300,000 tons of steel per Chinese New Year's Eve, but Austria's production is too low, mainly due to Germany's relatively high production, the Ruhr area alone has reached an annual order of 400,000 tons, plus our own enterprise capacity should be able to import 1.1 million tons of steel to East Africa a year."

"In addition to Luxembourg and the Ruhr region, our steel production capacity is mainly concentrated in the Czech Republic and Slovenia."

After the completion of the capital injection, the steel companies acquired by ERNST have been expanded, so their strength has been greatly supplemented.

Among them, Luxembourg and the Ruhr area are the key production areas, one is rich in iron ore, the other is rich in coal mines, the Czech Republic is a little worse, and the Slovenian region is entirely because of Trieste, the closest excellent port to East Africa.

Of course, East Africa itself is also responsible for a part of steel production, and steel plants will have to be built separately in this regard, and the good news is that there is no shortage of technicians and steel workers in Ernst at all, so there is no technical problem in building steel plants in East Africa.

However, it is obviously impossible for East Africa to absorb so many steel workers, some of whom are mainly to fill the population in East Africa, and do not need them to engage in steel production, and the most likely is to arrange for inland land reclamation.

Cross-industry employment is not a big problem, and European countries have only been industrialized in the past few years, and many workers are from rural areas, and it is impossible to say that they do not know how to farm.

"With the help of this economic depression, we are going to absorb the unemployed and agricultural population in Austria and its surroundings on a large scale in Austria-Hungary, with a focus on those who are not Germans, and as for the Germans, let the Austro-Hungarian Empire keep them!" Ernst emphasized.

It was really not easy for the Habsburgs, Slavic (Czech, Slovak, Polish, Slovenian, Croatian, Serbian...... The population plus Latinos (Romanian and Italian) make up more than half, and Austrians and Hungarians combined don't make up half of the population.

Ernst could not change the demographic structure of the entire Austro-Hungarian Empire, but it could still be done only by changing Austria and its surroundings.

There were two places that Ernst considered to have the greatest effect on Austria: the Czech region and Slovenia, which meant industry, and Slovenia which represented the port.

As for where East Africa will absorb Germans this time, apart from Germany, the largest source country is the United States.

Ernst's strategy of recruiting immigrants in Austria-Hungary would certainly not have been done before, but at this time, at this time.

In the past, East Africa was in dire need of German-speaking population, and in Austria it was hungry, but now there is no shortage in East Africa, and through nearly a decade of efforts, German has basically become the unified language of East Africa.

There are no statistics for the population of East Africa in these two years, but Ernst estimates that the current population of East Africa should be around 8 million to 9 million, and the German-speaking population will be at least 7 million.

As for the newcomers who don't speak German, if they are placed in the big dye vat of East Africa, they can basically become Germans through the linguistic environment in less than a year, and they are too stupid to do anything.

With the unification of languages, the matter of cultural identity is basically a minutiae, and now East Africa can choose from all over the world the "quality" immigrants of their choice.

However, there is no need to do this in the economic crisis, there are unemployed people all over Europe and the United States, and the history of the United States alone has recorded more than 3 million unemployed people, and this is only an estimate, and the real number is certainly more than that.

There were certainly no fewer unemployed people in Germany and Austria-Hungary, and Ernst was sure that there were more unemployed people in Germany than in the United States, because the current population of Germany was higher than that of the United States.

Even if there is no economic crisis, Germany has the largest number of people leaving the country in the world, which also shows that the unemployment rate in Germany is high in normal times, and it will definitely be more after the economic crisis erupts. In terms of the territory of the two countries alone, it is impossible for Germany to have more means to deal with the crisis than the United States.

Historically, the reversal of the German exodus was not until the end of the 19th century, that is, after 1893, so Germany's potential was still great.

In addition to the industrial development of the southwest (mainly Lorraine and Alsace led the development of the steel and textile industries), digesting a large number of people, there is also the fact that it has been absorbed by East Africa for ten years, and there is basically no overpopulation in the southwest, but East Prussia is seriously overpopulated because of the backward level of industrial development and agriculture.

(End of chapter)