Chapter 293: Encouraging Migration

  Chapter 283 – Encouraging Emigration

Looking forward to the moon and the moon, news of the great Indian uprising finally reached Vienna in July, and Franz knew that trouble was coming for the British.

During this period, 40,000 British troops and 230,000 Indian troops controlled the Indian subcontinent. From the beginning of 1857, there were constant rumors of mutinies in the Indian army, only to be suppressed by the British.

On May 10, three Indian regiments revolted, captured the ancient capital of Delhi, and declared the restoration of the Mughal Empire, causing a shock in India and a wave of revolts that quickly spread throughout the country.

Needless to say, Franz fulfilled his duty as an ally and was the first to inform the government in St. Petersburg. What happened next, that is unknown.

If the Anglo-Austrian negotiations went well, then the future government in Vienna would be very peaceful and would not do anything; if the negotiations broke down, then it would not be a bad idea to support the independence movement of the Indian people.

Prime Minister Felix said murderously, “Your Majesty, the time is ripe.

The war between the British and Persia is still unresolved, and now that the Great Indian Uprising has broken out, I am afraid that St. Petersburg’s ambitions for India will not be able to hold back.

The government in London is preoccupied with its own affairs, and it is necessary for us to pay a friendly state visit to the Ottoman Empire, and to promote a little friendship between the two parties.”

Friendship, when did the Habsburgs ever have friendship with the Ottoman Empire?

Turning to the family history, it was a history of blood and tears with the Ottoman Empire, not just one ancestor trying to fuck the Ottoman Empire over.

To Franz generation, finally saw the light, the Ottoman Empire was driven out of the Balkan Peninsula, once a threat to the survival of the Habsburg dynasty behemoth, now turned into a soft shrimp.

Franz smiled and said, “Then pick a nice windy day and pay a state visit to the Sudanese government!”

In view of the longstanding traditional friendship between the two countries, falling on the Ottoman Empire was an unshirkable and sacred responsibility of the heirs of the Habsburg dynasty, which had to be carried out without any compromise.

Colonial Minister Josip Jelacic proposed, “Your Majesty, it is time for us to move on the African continent. Now that the French have accelerated the pace of their expansion on the continent, we will fall behind if we delay any longer.”

Interest is always the best catalyst, and only three years ago, with Franz’s support, the Vienna government had only narrowly passed a state policy of overseas colonization.

By now, even among the traditional conservatives, no one was opposed to overseas colonization activities.

On the surface the Austrian colonies were still generally in the red, but that was not the way the accounts were made. The colonies increased the market for domestic industrial and commercial products, and the gold that was mined solved Austria’s dilemma of lacking gold reserves.

The gold mines excavated in this era are easy to mine rich mines, every year dozens of tons of gold into Austria, stabilized the value of the divine shield.

It can be said that without the gold in the Gulf of Guinea, the Vienna government’s reform of the gold standard system, would not have been so smooth.

In addition to this, there are fewer unstable elements in the country, and the colony has given space for ambitious people to exert their influence, and has also made a lot of people rich.

Franz thought for a moment and said, “It can be done, but the Tekrul Kingdom in the Nigerian region is ambitious and wants to build its empire even further, launching a so-called holy war, so it’s best if we don’t rush to get involved.

Let the locals fight internally first, and when they’re almost done, we’ll step in and can sell some old weapons to them.”

Leaving aside the resources underground for a moment, the Nigerian region is close to the equator, with fertile land and plenty of rainfall, making it suitable for growing tropical crops such as: peanuts, palm, cocoa, rubber ……

It is a treasure trove of land for the keen farm owner. There are upwards of 60 million hectares of arable land that can be exploited, enough to feed hundreds of millions of people.

The current push to make a move to Nigeria is by the aristocracy at home, many of whom lost their land in the Revolution and want to make up for it overseas.

This is the result of the guidance of the Vienna government, the upward trend is universal in any country, in this regard the Vienna government has done very well.

Higher levels of the government had opened up plantations overseas, which made many people find it profitable to join in the activity.

The royal family was the first to run in the Guinea and Congo colonies, and has now planned seven or eight plantations, including rubber plantations, cotton plantations, coffee plantations, and cocoa plantations …… with a total area of more than 1.5 million hectares.

Of course, this is only a theoretical plan, when it can be completed, is still an unknown.

As of now, the royal family has also developed more than 15,000 hectares of land, the rest of the area, or a group of lumberjacks in the hard work.

First, the trees must be cut down, the grass on the ground burned, the water in the pits drained, and the local poisonous insects eliminated before the farmland can be developed.

Without enough labor, forced to use local people as laborers, it is difficult to increase the efficiency of this work.

Franz had sent people to East Asia to bring in laborers, and farming was also a skilled job, especially in clearing the land, and the local natives were obviously not suited for the job.

Austria prohibited the use of slaves, and the colonial government also prohibited the use of slaves for the sake of the long-term stability of the colony, and even the labor protection law was required to be strictly enforced.

Of course, “strictly enforced” was a different matter, but of course the immigrants from the country were strictly protected, and they were a valuable asset.

For local laborers, of course, the regulation is not so strict, and the biggest problem is only a fine. Unless someone has a mixed race child, they will not go to jail.

Essentially, this was also to limit capitalists from becoming dependent on local labor, and the spread of disease.

It was made clear through the labor protection laws that once the labor shortage in the colonies was solved, then the labor protection laws were going to be strictly enforced, and it was better to use local labor as little as possible.

In order to minimize conflict between the colonial government and the indigenous tribes, the colonial government implemented a policy of encouraging immigration, which consisted of two parts: one part encouraging the domestic population to immigrate to the colonies, and one part encouraging the local natives to immigrate to the Americas.

On this issue, the Government of Vienna had already reached immigration agreements with the United States, Brazil, Argentina, Portugal, Spain and other countries.

The treaty stipulated that each country was free to bring in indigenous immigrants in the Austrian colonies without any restrictions from the colonial government.

The Vienna government will also give rewards to individuals or organizations that perform outstandingly in the immigration work, and the current standard is: 2 divine guilders for every ten native immigrants taken.

Under this favorable condition, more than 100,000 black immigrants left the Austrian colonies every year, greatly reducing the conflict between the colonial government and the local indigenous tribes.

(End of chapter)