Chapter 821: Crisis is Always Accompanied by Opportunity

  Chapter 804 – In a Crisis Comes Opportunity

Since receiving the news of the French government’s intention to start the “Colonial Farms Program”, the Vienna government has been nervous.

To this day, agriculture is still the most important pillar industry in Austria, absorbing the largest number of employed people.

The capacity of the international food market is limited, if not Austria held an international agricultural summit, led the establishment of the International Agricultural Products Export Alliance, the major food-producing countries together to control the volume of exports, and jointly set the price of food sales, to avoid unhealthy competition, we do not have the current good times.

However, all of this is based on the premise of a basic balance between food supply and demand, any country to increase food production capacity will cause market shocks.

Franz: “How many French colonies are suitable for agricultural development?”

Colonial Minister Stephen replied, “According to the information gathered by the Colonial Ministry, it is deduced that there are millions of square kilometers of exploitable arable land in French Africa alone, and there are roughly more than half a million square kilometers of fertile land suitable for agricultural production.

It is mainly distributed over 210,000 square kilometers in French Algeria, 120,000 square kilometers in French Morocco, 40,000 square kilometers in French Tunisia, and 60,000 square kilometers in French Egypt ……”

The natural environment and boundaries of this era are different from those of later times, and discrepancies in the area of cultivated land are inevitable.

For example: Tunisia is divided between Britain and France, Morocco is also filled with British, French and Western forces, French Egypt also includes half of the Sudan.

Hearing this answer, the crowd’s expression became more grave.

So many places, not to say all developed, even if the development of one-third, or even one-fifth out, the French will be able to do self-sufficiency.

The desert empire is not all desert, just French Africa has so much fertile land, if you count the French overseas other colonies, it is estimated that this number can be doubled.

In Franz’s interest, the central and southern peninsulas were perfect for agriculture, a little farther away, but the French had tariff barriers.

The French had tariff barriers, and the development of any part of this land could devastate the international food market.

The French didn’t even need to go out and grab the international market, just achieving domestic self-sufficiency was enough to crash the international food market.

Knowing that, the Vienna government can not do anything about it. The French developed their own land, Austria has no reason to interfere.

After a few moments of contemplation, Franz slowly said: “This is something sooner or later, no big country is willing to be subjected to others in strategic security, the French are no exception.

Even if it is not profitable to invest in farms in the colonies, as long as it can ensure food self-sufficiency and reduce the loss of foreign exchange, the economy is to earn back.

Now can stop the French, only the French themselves. Agricultural investment is not something that can see a return in a short time.

Reclamation of wasteland, construction of water conservancy projects, roads, all of which require a lot of preliminary investment, no one to do business at a loss.

Capitalists will not be happy to invest in the colonial farm development program, which can only be paid for by the French government.

In the present situation, the French government is far from being so rich that it can easily come up with the money for agricultural development, and in the short term their investment in agriculture will remain limited.

For at least three to five years, we don’t have to worry about the international food market collapsing. A lot can already be done in such a long time.”

Opening up land is not just talk, perhaps opening up a piece of farmland is simple, a fire to burn the trees and weeds, and then leveling the land is done.

With the exception of a very small number of areas with favorable natural conditions and plenty of water, most of the areas were in need of water conservation.

Once the grain was planted, it wasn’t the end. If it cannot be shipped out for sale, even mountains of grain do not have any value.

Combining all the factors, three to five years is already optimistic. It is estimated that only the coastal areas can produce some results, and the inland areas may not be able to develop in ten or eight years.

There is a buffer time, but it does not make people optimistic. Disaster will still break out, just a matter of time.

Foreign Minister Weissenberg suggested: “This is no longer a matter for us, perhaps it would be more effective to spread the word.

If we can pull in all the member countries of the Agricultural Export Union and put pressure on the French together, there might be unexpected gains.”

Undoubtedly, it was mainly Russia and Austria that were responsible for exerting pressure, and the other alliance members would be able to wave their flags.

Forcing the French to back down would certainly be a happy occasion for all. But it’s unlikely, if it’s compromised so easily, there’s no way for France to hang around on the European continent.

Prime Minister Karl shook his head: ”There’s no need, this kind of thing can’t be kept secret. As soon as the French colonial farm program is opened, everyone will know about it.

If international food prices immediately collapse, then we are indeed the biggest victim, but isn’t there a buffer of a few years?

Although the local food production capacity is still growing, this increase is just less than one and a half percent, while the growth rate of food consumption in the domestic market is as high as four and a half percent.

If the Near East Development Program hadn’t been launched and food production capacity could have continued to grow in the future, it might not have taken ten years for us to have just enough food production capacity to meet our local needs.

Currently, most of the grain we export is imported from the Russians, so if there is an overcapacity again, we can pass on the loss by lowering the purchase price of the raw grain.

A strong Russian empire is not in our interest, and it would be in our interest to use the French to interrupt the Russians’ growth.

Better yet, if possible, lasso the British into it.

With Britain and France implementing food self-sufficiency programs at the same time, the international food import market can directly shrink by half, just in time for everyone to get a good feel for the power of the agricultural crisis.”

The large growth rate of food consumption is due to a number of reasons, the most direct being population growth, which increases food consumption.

The second is the increasing standard of living of the population, everyone’s consumption level is also increasing, the most typical is the high speed increase in the consumption of meat products.

As a result, the amount of grain used as feed is also growing at a high rate, with an annual growth rate of more than five percent.

Finally, the increase in industrial grain, including pharmaceuticals, chemicals, alcohol, starch and many other industries, the demand for grain are continuing to grow.

Rapid growth in demand does not mean that production capacity can also grow rapidly. In fact, since the outbreak of the agricultural crisis, the Government of Vienna has been encouraging the cultivation of cash crops.

It’s not that Franz doesn’t know the importance of food, but Austria really doesn’t have a shortage of food, and the consequence of continuing to increase production capacity is that the grain is cheap, or even directly rotting in the ground.

Otherwise, the Agricultural Export Alliance was established, and it is estimated that we are all still in the middle of the agricultural crisis, and we are all pouring milk into the river together.

Of course, pulling in the Russians is also one of the reasons.

More than ninety percent of the grain exported by the Russian Empire each year goes to Austria, and nearly half of it, after processing, ends up going back to Russia for sale.

The Russian-Austrian alliance was able to continue, civil relations have remained friendly, in essence, is also based on interests.

Normally speaking, an alliance based on interests is often the strongest, however, this kind of relationship between Russia and Austria is an exception.

Should the Russians someday complete the Industrial Revolution and a homegrown processing industry develops, the chain of grain interests would be broken.

But this is something for the future and not something to worry about in the short term.

In the context of the imperfect infrastructure, the noble lords of the tsarist government, still prefer to be dry mine bosses and large landowners, and are not keen on the risky industry.

Franz was well aware that these were only superficial reasons. Ten years later, the Near East development program should almost be completed, Austria is truly a great power.

At that time, the German unification process should also be on the agenda. The Vienna government will not do anything to actively break the situation to pull hatred.

Austria has not yet the ability to take on the European world alone, stirring up the relationship between the European countries, it is very necessary.

The French colonial development program, indeed damage to the interests of Austria, but compared with the national strategy, the temporary loss is still acceptable.

By encouraging the British to join in, it appeared that the British and the French had achieved self-sufficiency in food, and their national strategic security was no longer restricted, but in fact, it also put them on the opposite side of the Russians.

Moving the Russian cheese involves the interests of tens of millions of people, even if the Tsarist government wants to stand with Britain and France, the Russian people will not agree.

The chances of failure with one against three were too high, and the chances of winning with one against two, two against two, or simply one against one, were greatly increased.

As a mature monarch, Franz still felt that it was better not to fight if he could.

“The Prime Minister is right, the French want to develop colonies, we simply cannot stop them, and there is no need to do so.

The Foreign Ministry made a show of letting the outside world know that we are very unhappy, and it is best to make the British feel that the French hit us in our soft underbelly with this blow.

Induce the London government to join in and artificially create an agricultural crisis of the worst kind to create an opportunity for the next step in our strategy.”

An agricultural crisis was no fun, and if it really happened, the food-exporting countries would certainly lose a great deal of money, and the two participants, Britain and France, would definitely not have an easy time of it.

The French are fine, there are tariff barriers to protect them, and the Paris government is not going to let domestic food prices collapse.

The British will be in trouble, free trade is always a double-edged sword, in the enjoyment of the benefits of free trade at the same time, but also must bear the negative effects it brings.

To the British style, once the agricultural crisis broke out, the investment in the early stage of all the water, the Congress of the gang of lords will order the government to stop the loss.

Consumption of money is a small matter, the key is the political turmoil, can delay the British government to make a decision time, which is very favorable to Austria’s next plan.

(End of chapter)