African Entrepreneurship Record

Speaking of Dupin's company, it is relatively well-known in Mombasa. Its main business is to transport agricultural products from the Great Lakes region to Mombasa for export overseas.

However, compared to the several grain trading giants of East African state-owned enterprises, Du Ping's small company has limited energy after all. Therefore, so far, Du Ping's grain trading company can only accept orders from some small and poor countries in the Middle East or Europe.

Among them, several countries in the Italian Peninsula are the most important business areas of Dupin Company. In addition to Teka, Dupin also knows many Italian businessmen and has business contacts.

Today, the Italian peninsula is considered a relatively explosive region in Europe. Of the three countries on the peninsula, the Kingdom of Italy, which has the best economic situation, can barely achieve self-sufficiency in food. This is with the support of the Red Sea colonies.

The situation in the Papal States and Naples is even worse. Naples has become one of the areas with the most serious population outflow in Europe and has made important contributions to the immigration cause of various countries in the Americas and East Africa.

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Small businessmen like Dupin are aware of the risks of today's trade between East Africa and Europe, and the East African government is no exception.

June 29, 1915.

The East African government convened another meeting specifically for this purpose.

"Just in May this year, many of our ships were illegally stopped by British warships. This was the result of our escort arrangements by warships in the Atlantic direction."

"As for the Suez Canal, the British have also tightened their inspections of our merchant ships. It is obvious that the British are consciously obstructing our trade activities with the Allies." John Lear, Minister of Commerce of East Africa, said worriedly.

In comparison, the situation in the direction of Gibraltar is much better. After all, there is Spain in the direction of Gibraltar. Although the Port of Gibraltar is in the hands of the British, the Strait of Gibraltar is not completely controlled by the British like the Suez Canal.

Merkel also said: "Now it seems that our trade in the Mediterranean is very passive. There are only two maritime trade channels between East Africa and Mediterranean countries. One is the Suez Canal and the other is the Strait of Gibraltar, both of which are under the surveillance of the British."

"So in order to broaden the security of our country's trade routes, is it necessary to use land transportation through North Africa, learn from Germany's experience in building the Baghdad Railway, and build several railways across the Sahara Desert and directly out to sea from the southern coast of the Mediterranean."

Merkel's bold idea has indeed aroused controversy among many people. As the world's largest desert, building a railway through the Sahara Desert would be an incredible project.

In fact, no one in East Africa has thought about building a railway in the Sahara, but this is the first time it has been discussed at a high-level meeting.

Sweet shook his head and said: "It is beyond imagination to build a railway in the Sahara Desert, and the cost is certainly unacceptable."

"There is not much population in the entire Sahara Desert, and the desert terrain will inevitably increase the difficulty of selecting the route of this railway. I am afraid that the cost of building this railway will not be recovered in a hundred years."

Whether the railway is profitable or not has a lot to do with the economic conditions along the route. However, most of the Sahara Desert is an uninhabited and barren land with no economic value at all. After all, there are no people, let alone the creation of economic value.

Ernst did not express his opinion directly, but asked Minister Andrei of the Ministry of Railways: "If this railway is built, is it possible? Are there any technical problems that cannot be solved?"

Minister Andre shook his head and said: "There should be difficulty, but it is not the decisive factor. After all, we have a lot of railway construction experience in Somalia and Southwest Africa, and the terrain conditions in Southwest Africa are much more complex than the Sahara Desert. Not only the desert, but also the The terrain is more complex, with many mountains and canyons.”

"But we have still built a lot of railways in southwest Africa, so in theory there is no technically unsolvable problem in building the Saharan railway."

"However, as the Duke of White said, the cost of building the Sahara Railway is too high, and I think it is not worth the gain."

"After all, the Sahara Desert is not our territory. Our railway construction in Southwest Africa is related to people's livelihood, national defense, economy and other aspects. For other countries in the Sahara Desert, we will definitely only consider economic value."

The railways in Southwest Africa are of national defense and people's livelihood projects far higher than their economic value. What's more, Southwest Africa has a lot of mineral resources, so the construction of railways in Southwest Africa is a must for the East African government.

The Sahara Desert is different. In fact, Andre's words are not rigorous, that is, the Sahara Desert still has some relationship with East Africa. For example, the city of Gezira in East Africa is also part of the Sahara Desert, so East Africa is in the Sahara Desert. Not only the country but also quite a lot.

Of course, as the world's largest desert, the territory of the Sahara Desert occupied by East Africa is just some marginal scraps, which is completely worthless compared with the main body of the Sahara Desert.

Merkel said: "It may not be completely without value. This is mainly related to the choice of route. For example, if we choose Egyptian territory as the Sahara railway line, we can connect Egypt and East Africa."

“Imagine that starting from the city of Gezira to Alexandria in the north, this line can directly follow the Nile River and connect all the core land of Egypt. In this way, we can strengthen our access to the hinterland of Egypt through this railway. economic impact."

"After all, Egypt's economy is still pretty good. If we choose the eastern route option, it will not be completely unprofitable for us, and we can go one step further in terms of geostrategy."

Merkel's statement was very convincing, but Sweet poured cold water on it: "This plan is completely unfeasible. Let's not mention the trade between East Africa and Egypt. It is impossible to compete on the Red Sea route on land, and by sea. The advantage is too great.”

"What's more, Egypt is the British sphere of influence. Under this premise, it is impossible for us to build this railway at this stage."

Egypt will definitely be excited to build this railway, but Egypt is not a sovereign country, but a British semi-colony. Apart from other things, the British control over Sudan at this stage is much higher than that of the Egyptian government. After all, Sudan was conquered by the British.

Andre also interjected: "The Red Sea route and the Sahara railway mentioned by Chancellor Merk can be said to be parallel lines, and the two are too close and the competition is too fierce. If there is no Red Sea, we will definitely build this railway. It’s huge, but the existence of the Red Sea makes it impossible for us to do such a thankless thing unless..."

Unless East Africa wants to plot something against Egypt, although Andre did not finish speaking, most people have already guessed it.

After all, if a railway running through the core area of ​​Egypt is in the hands of East Africa, it will basically declare Egypt to be completely reduced to an economic vassal of East Africa.

Of course, East Africa definitely does not have this idea now. The main reason is that it does not want to fall out with the United Kingdom. East Africa has always been interested in Egypt.

However, Sweet believes that this railway can be used to "seduce" the Egyptian government, thereby putting pressure on Britain to make some concessions on the Suez Canal.

After all, losing Egypt means losing the Suez Canal. If East Africa builds a railway in Egypt, all aspects of the Egyptian economy will be affected by East Africa, thus threatening Britain's control of Egypt.

This is definitely not what the British want to see, so even if East Africa only wants to build this railway verbally, the British will strongly oppose it. After all, Egypt is too important to the British.

So Ernst said to the ministers: "We can use the Egyptian railway as a cover to get Britain to correct its attitude on the Red Sea route, so first contact the Egyptian government to publicize this plan. I think Britain will definitely make a move towards us." concession."