Chapter 536: Things to be done

  Chapter 524: The matter has been dealt with

The Berlin government’s top brass are mostly from the military, and have always done things with great force, and since they decided to screw the Poles, they naturally won’t be soft.

Because of the problem of the Polish throne dispute, between Prussia and Poland also buried nails. The Poles, who had achieved independence with great difficulty, were not willing to be annexed by Prussia.

Coupled with the interference of international forces, constantly amplifying the Prussian-Polish conflict, if not for the presence of the Russians as a great enemy, the two countries would have parted ways.

Even so, the radicals in the Polish government did not want to see the Prussians pointing fingers and wanted to kick off Prussia to go it alone.

These were problems that the Berlin government was anxious to see. The center two radical elements are not easy to deal with, and a bad operation can trigger a violent backlash.

The Berlin government has long had the idea of killing people with a knife, but the operation of the hidden danger is quite large, a bad is a disaster.

To deal with the Russian Empire, the Kingdom of Prussia needs Polish cannon fodder, can not let Poland be crippled.

If it is not the Russian-Austrian relations rupture, Mauch is absolutely not dare to put forward this proposal. Otherwise, the Russians took the opportunity to participate in, forcibly pull Austria down, Prussia and Poland is not the opponent of Russia and Austria.

Now that the Russian-Austrian alliance was in trouble, Austria also needed to weaken the Russians by the hands of Puppo, and against this background the Vienna government could at most teach the Poles a lesson, and could not possibly cripple them for real.

How much the Poles would have to pay for this, the Berlin government didn’t care one bit. Despite seeing Poland as in the bag, there was one reality that they had to face.

Poland was too big for the Kingdom of Prussia, and if they swallowed it in one gulp, the end result would most likely be choking to death.

In the first Russo-Prussian War, the reason why the Poles suffered heavy losses, to Prussia’s handiwork. It was only done in a more covert manner, not known to the outside world.

It’s really easy to agitate middle-aged teenagers, stirring up public opinion is enough, and newspapers are the most favorable weapon. Overnight, the old story of the partition of Poland by Prussia, Russia and Austria was rehashed.

Of course, the Kingdom of Prussia was hidden, the newspaper has become Russia and Austria to divide the Kingdom of Poland, Austria’s role was artificially magnified.

……

St. Petersburg, since Austria pulled off the dumping and the international food price bloodbath, Alexander II’s whole body is not good.

After struggling hard for so many years, it was not easy to solve the land problem of the Russian Empire, and before he could harvest the fruits of victory, he was greeted with a blow to the head.

Austria’s retaliation is really too ruthless, if you can not get through this agricultural crisis, the Russian Empire will soon be in great trouble.

The main financial problems, Russia is not an industrialized country, agricultural tax revenue is still the government’s main income, occupies more than half of all financial income.

Food prices collapsed, which means that the tsarist government’s finances to cool. The loans from the British were used to build railroads and develop industry, not to maintain the government’s daily expenses.

This is still based on the British performance, if John Bull disavowed the debt, then the Tsarist government would really be bankrupt. Even though they only went bankrupt once a few years ago.

Don’t look at the contract between the two countries, but the loans were not made in one go. The British were releasing the money in batches, and right now the Tsarist government had merely gotten over five million pounds.

For an individual, it was a huge sum; for the Russian Empire, the money was a matter of a few hundred kilometers of railroad.

Don’t think it’s expensive; with the complex terrain, the harsh climate, and the rails imported from England, it would be a shame if the final cost wasn’t high.

John Bull’s loans were not easy to come by; fifty percent of them had to be used to purchase British goods, and the construction of the railroads was mandated to purchase rails from Britain.

Foreign Minister Chris Basham took out a document and handed it to Alexander II.

“Your Majesty, the Austrians yesterday once again sent an Initiative for the Reduction of Grain Capacity to the world’s major grain exporters, and they are proposing that countries cut their grain capacity by eight percent in 1873 in response to the agricultural crisis.”

8% of food production capacity, not 8% on the export international trading market, but 8% of the total food production of each country, converted into production that would be a drop of tens of millions of tons in global food production.

If this can be done then the agricultural crisis is over half way through. The 21% overcapacity announced by Austria was a theoretical figure calculated by means of a formula.

It is only an estimate of the demand for food, for brewing, for industrial use, and for making feed.

In reality, food is inevitably wasted. For example: loss during transportation, moldy food due to weather, waste in daily life ……

If several grain-exporting countries, at the same time, cut their production capacity by 8%, then the grain that can flow into the international market is basically restored to the level of 1870.

Because the population is growing, in two or three years at the most, the extra food that is now on the market will be consumed and food prices will normalize.

On the face of it, there is nothing wrong with the Austrian initiative. All the major grain-exporting countries are reducing their production in the same proportion to maintain stable market prices, which is equivalent to accepting the Russian Empire as a member of the group, and Austria has also ceded a large chunk of the market.

In reality, this was very fatal for the Tsarist government. Reducing production is easier said than done. If you want to let the Russian Empire next year grain production increased by 8%, it is very simple to expand the planting area will be.

Now the Russian people’s enthusiasm for planting grain is high, production is climbing, as long as the transportation problem is solved, to replace Austria as the world’s first grain exporting country, that is not a problem at all.

But to reduce production, this is not good, the government can not prohibit the people to grow food, right? Russia is tens of millions of farmers, they themselves increase the area of grain cultivation, no one can stop.

Even if they copied Austria’s fallow law, it would be useless, Russia has plenty of land. As for Austria’s open-field law, the tsarist government wouldn’t dare to follow suit, that is going to be a problem.

After pondering for a while, Alexander II turned his gaze to the crowd.

“What do you think, is the Austrian proposal feasible?”

An obese middle-aged man stood up emotionally and said with righteous indignation, “Your Majesty, this is an Austrian plot. Cutting food production capacity by 8% in one year, how can this be done?

Even if international grain prices are low now, waiting for farmers to regulate their growing habits on their own is still a long process.

It is impossible for the government to directly dictate, what farmers should plant. Agricultural overcapacity is similar to industrial overcapacity, and after a crisis, the market will make choices for survival of the fittest.

If we force a cut in production capacity, it will not be of any value at all, except for triggering a big mess.

The Austrians are demonstrating to us that they want to use low food prices to force us to compromise with them.”

Manilov wasn’t stupid, as Minister of Agriculture he knew very well how motivated the Russian peasants were to grow food right now, asking them to cut production at this time would be an out and out effort.

Russia and Austria are quite different, and the conditions of the two countries are very different. The government in Vienna has curbed the rise in the area of land used for growing grain as soon as the law was introduced.

The big nobles at the top of the government just had to take the lead and switch to cash crops on their own land, and there would still be a lot of people responding. The Russian nobility that was different, switching to cash crops seemed easy, the problem was who were they selling to?

This is the gap between agricultural and industrial countries, Austrian industry is complete, transportation, communication are more developed, information is relatively transparent.

These aristocrats in the upper echelons of society, want to understand the market situation is still very simple, know what will be sold.

The Russian Empire is not the same, the local industry has just begun, poor transportation and isolation of communication, not to mention the telephone, even the telegraph has not been able to spread to every city.

Even if someone wanted to switch to cash crops, they didn’t know what to plant. Even if they planted them, they didn’t know where to transport them to sell them.

Lacking effective sales channels, people naturally can only plant conservatively. Regardless of the price of food, at least the food is good for sale and there are merchants to buy it.

If one were to plant cash crops, then one would have to think about it. If there is a corresponding factory in the vicinity, then there is no problem, we can rest assured that bold planting.

If there is no factory, then it has to be on a large scale, if the capacity is not enough, it may not even be enough to cover the transportation costs.

Foreign Minister Chris Basham: “Margrave Manilov, please calm down first. Don’t forget that Austria is the biggest exporter of agricultural products, and they have the most to lose at this rate.

After the bloodbath of raw grain prices, the prices of finished grains are also falling. If it continues, eventually these processing companies will not be able to escape.

In order to protect domestic enterprises, the Vienna government has already given these enterprises tax cuts, but the Austrians’ share of the international market is still shrinking.

After getting cheap raw materials, the grain processing enterprises in the countries that were suppressed by Austria have now begun to flourish.

If the situation of oversupply does not change and the price of raw grain continues to be low, the grain processing enterprises of European countries can soon develop.

From the point of view of interests, the initiative issued by the Austrians is still more for the sake of preserving the domestic processing industry.

In any case, Austria is still our most important grain exporter now, and even if the British market is reopened, it will not change this fact.

If Austria refuses to accept our agricultural products, that would be the beginning of the disaster, and no European country has anyone with such a large-scale agricultural processing industry chain yet.”

Alexander II reached out and slapped his forehead, a bumper grain harvest was also a headache. Supply exceeds demand on the international grain market, and this year’s grain stagnation has become a foregone conclusion.

Once the loss of Austria as the largest buyer, then the domestic piles of grain will really not be able to do anything. Preliminary estimates, this year the Russian Empire extra grain, there are tens of millions of tons.

In addition to that contract in Britain that is not sure if it can be honored, they currently do not have any large orders. At the same price point, no one could want their grain.

Everyone had stable suppliers, so how could they just change them for no reason, or change them to someone they hated.

It can’t be helped, the Russians have been blackballed in Europe in recent years. Now seventy percent of Europeans do not recognize Russia as a European country, and Russians naturally do not count as Europeans.

The remaining thirty percent who recognize them as Europeans include more than seventy-four million Russians. In this era, the European continent, the total population is less than 300 million, so this proportion is quite touching.

Fortunately, so much food, at least half of it is not shipped out, otherwise the competition in the international food market would be even more brutal.

This is the complete opposite of Alexander II’s initial plan, and originally he wanted to use grain as ammunition to pry the European hegemony. As a result, it smashed in his own hands before he had a chance to start.

There was no problem with the plan, it was just that the change was somewhat sudden. The main grain exporters in continental Europe were Austria, Russia, Poland, Prussia, and the rest were not worth mentioning.

Overseas competitors, for the time being, are not a climate. Because the countries of the Americas also send just over a million tons of agricultural products to the European continent every year, the market share is not high.

This is the interests of the decision, the United States of America, the United States of America is still growing cotton on the road farther and farther, and now their cotton hegemony is still unbreakable.

The same price to fight quality, the same quality to fight price, this year there is no region of cotton can compete with them.

The British Egyptian cotton planting program died early, the French occupation of Egypt, once wanted to develop the cotton industry, only in the United States under the impact of cotton, the French finally gave up.

The British pounded the Indian cotton, regrettably the cost of the Americans were finished. Before the interests of non-negotiable, Indian cotton can not become mainstream.

Austria’s West African cotton planting base, not much better. Production has barely increased over the years, and domestic capitalists are also big fans of American cotton.

There is no way, this is a unique natural conditions caused by. If enterprises do not use the cotton of the Union State, the products produced lack of market competitiveness.

The government is not omnipotent, it is impossible to run what industry to foster, the result of dispersed efforts, often end up with nothing. Austria has no advantage in the cotton industry market, the Vienna government naturally will not invest in this.

If it were not for the fact that there is less of this one strong rival, everyone’s days would be even more difficult.

At present, the grain exporting countries in the Americas are mainly Brazil and Argentina, but these two countries have fewer people and limited grain cultivation area, and their production capacity is not very large.

Getting up and wandering for a few steps, Alexander II had a bright idea and made a decision.

“Reply to the Austrians and tell them that the Russian Empire is also a responsible power, and that we agree to cut down on grain production capacity. It would be good to follow Austria’s example with specific measures, except that they need to be changed.

The land fallow law is no problem, just move it over. The law on land reclamation is changed to from now on: newly reclaimed wasteland may not be planted with grain for five years.”

Alexander II had already seen the consequences of overcapacity, and since international grain exports were no longer profitable, he didn’t want to continue to increase grain capacity.

In that case, it would be better to simply give the Vienna government a face. The Russian Empire is not increasing its grain capacity for the time being, but reducing it would be better to forget about it, such a challenging thing is not something that the Tsarist government can do.

(End of chapter)