Chapter 1074 Market and Contradiction
During the entire Second Five-Year Plan, the national industrial output value of East Africa increased by 187%, while the First Five-Year Plan only increased by 103%, which was significantly higher than the First Five-Year Plan. Such a high growth rate is closely related to the comprehensive outbreak of advantageous industries such as automobiles and electricity during the Second Five-Year Plan.
In particular, industries such as automobiles and tractors have a very obvious driving effect on East African industry and have become the flagship products of East African industrial exports.
In the past, although East Africa was also a strong country in automobiles, tractors and other machinery, the scale of production and export was not large at that time. During the Second Five-Year Plan, due to the development of related industries in the United States and Europe, East Africa began to increase the scale of exports of large machinery such as automobiles and tractors.
At this time, the cost of American automobile manufacturers has been compressed to less than one thousand US dollars per vehicle. Many car companies such as Ford and General Motors have developed rapidly, and the American automobile industry has begun to take shape.
Therefore, in order to cope with the competition from these emerging forces, East Africa has increased its dumping efforts in the international market, bringing a "warmth" to the international automobile market.
The automobile industry alone had a huge impact on the national industry during the Second Five-Year Plan in East Africa. Automobiles are high-value-added industrial products, which greatly increased the overall industrial output value of East Africa and promoted the rapid development of related industries, such as bearings, engines, rubber, steel, alloys, petroleum, chemicals, etc.
In the past, the automobile industry was Japan's largest industry. The automobile industry accounted for about 10% of Japan's GDP and as much as 40% of its manufacturing industry. In Germany, which is also a manufacturing power, the automobile industry accounted for more than 50% of the manufacturing industry and about 9% of the GDP.
From the importance of the automobile industry to Japan and Germany in the past, it can be seen that the automobile industry has a strong driving ability for the economy and industry. At present, as the world's largest automobile producer, East Africa's automobile industry has a significant driving effect on its own economy.
This is vividly reflected in the export of East African domestic industrial products during the Second Five-Year Plan. Although the export of East African power equipment and products was already excellent in the 1990s, countries such as the United States and Germany were still competitive. During the two five-year plans, the East African automobile industry completely formed a crushing advantage over the two countries.
To be honest, the automobile industry is the main reason why the industrial growth rate in East Africa during the Second Five-Year Plan was significantly higher than that in the First Five-Year Plan. Of course, East Africa's development in other aspects is not bad.
Especially in the production of civilian industrial products, East Africa has significantly improved compared with the previous period. During the Second Five-Year Plan, light industrial production has become a new growth point for East Africa's industrial growth. Although the export performance is not satisfactory, it meets most of the needs of the domestic market.
"By the end of 1909, my country's industrial scale was nearly three times that of 1900, and more than 13,000 large, medium and small enterprises were newly registered nationwide. During the Second Five-Year Plan, the increase in light industry was significant, heavy industry continued to maintain rapid development, and agriculture made steady progress."
During the two five-year plans alone, the number of East African enterprises exceeded the total number of East African construction enterprises in the entire 19th century, more than doubling, although East Africa had only a few decades due to historical reasons, and it had a place on the world stage in the middle and late 19th century.
During the Second Five-Year Plan, the development of heavy industry in East Africa remained in the first place, and the development of heavy industries such as steel, electricity, railways, energy, and mining made great contributions, especially the development of chemical and automobile industries.
Compared with the period of the First Five-Year Plan, light industry has received more attention, but the gap with other industrial countries is still significant, and the reasons are still technology, market, production efficiency, etc.
Agriculture focuses on stable development. During the Second Five-Year Plan, the increase in agricultural product exports in East Africa was not large, and international prices continued to be sluggish. However, due to the improvement of technology and mechanization, as well as the protection of East Africa's domestic market, it barely achieved positive growth in agricultural output value.
However, the East African government's investment in agriculture is also relatively high, so agricultural income has not met the psychological expectations of the East African government.
However, this is also expected by the East African government. Long before East Africa decided to vigorously develop industry, the East African government understood that there is no "future" in relying on the development of agriculture.
Especially after entering the 20th century, the population of East Africa has grown on a large scale. In the world, East Africa is no longer a country that has not been effectively developed.
In the past few decades, the amount of engineering in East Africa has even exceeded that of the entire South America for hundreds of years. Now in the entire sub-Saharan region, East Africa can compare industrial and agricultural data with any region in the world on its own.
"Among the world's major economies, East Africa's economic growth rate remains in the world's first echelon, with an annual economic growth rate exceeding that of the United States and Germany, maintaining around 10%."
Since 1890, East Africa's economy has remained at a high level, followed by the United States and then Germany. Of course, although the growth rates of the United States and Germany are not as fast as East Africa, their economic base is large, so the economic growth is greater than that of East Africa.
After entering 1900, economic crises frequently occurred in European and American countries, which further made East Africa's industrial growth rate stand out among the powerful countries, especially last year when the US economy and industry even declined to a certain extent, but the United States quickly adjusted.
The German economy was also affected to a certain extent, but Germany temporarily slowed down its decline by investing in the military industry, but this also allowed Germany to go one step further on the road of military expansion.
Industries in East Africa, the United States, and Germany have developed the fastest in the past 20 years, and other countries will only be worse. However, the three countries all face the same problem, that is, the market. In addition to their own factors, the market is the main limitation for further development.
The industrial level of countries such as Britain and France is obviously not in line with the international market they occupy, which is also the contradiction between emerging industrial countries and traditional industrial countries.
Of course, the contradiction between France and Germany is the most prominent, not just market factors. At least for France, if it wants to go further on the European continent, it can only defeat Germany, a strong enemy.
Apart from those colonial powers, the international market share of East Africa, the United States, and Germany is quite unstable. Although the industrial development of the three countries has surpassed other countries, the market cannot be opened by relying solely on the quality or cost advantages of their own industrial products.
For example, in the past, the trade between Britain and the Far East Empire, although the Far East Empire's industrial development was relatively backward, it could still beat Britain in international trade by relying solely on its strong traditional handicraft industry. In fact, the same was true for India before it was colonized by Britain. The Far East Empire and India were the two most important centers in the world before the advent of the industrial age.
At that time, emerging countries such as Britain eventually defeated this traditional power by using force to solve the problem.
Judging from the development paths of Britain, France and other countries, East Africa, the United States and Germany, if they want to break the current international system and compete for the international market, they will eventually have to solve it through war.
It's just that East Africa, like the United States, has much more options than Germany, so the main force to subvert the old world order still depends on Germany.
Large countries like East Africa and the United States have more resources to mobilize and more room for maneuver. They can deal with Britain or France with huge colonies, but Germany does not have such conditions. Germany has a small land area, scarce industrial development resources, and heavy population pressure.
So Germany may still be able to gamble on the war route. If it chooses a peaceful competition method, Germany's chances of winning are the smallest because Germany has the fewest cards in its hand.
Of course, if Germany chooses the latter, it may not be completely without advantages. Now that German industry has developed, coupled with its demographic advantage, if it can economically penetrate European countries, Germany's national strength still has a lot of room for improvement, but it is ultimately limited. After all, Britain, France, Austria and Russia are all big countries, and other countries are not weak either, so this path is quite difficult to take.