Chapter 478: Chapter 51, Indispensable Mistakes (Reward Extra)
 

The layout of the industrial sector was not limited to the steel industry. With the advent of the second industrial revolution, the applications of copper became ever more widespread.

In 1870, Austria’s copper production reached 580,000 tons, while the market demand was as high as 720,000 tons, creating a shortfall of one-sixth.

The primary cause of this situation was the arrival of the electrical era. As a vanguard driving the electrical revolution, Austria’s demand for copper naturally rose with each day.

To adjust the market supply and demand, the Vienna Government even resorted to administrative orders to increase production in state-owned enterprises, but this imbalance could not be changed in a short time.

There was no remedy for it: if there was a shortage of steel, one could still purchase it on the international market, but copper was not to be hoped for.

Austria’s copper mining production surpassed the total of all other European countries, and even for the British, the copper production of the era was simply a pitiful few tens of thousands of tons.

It wasn’t that everyone didn’t want to increase production; the issue was that there were no mines at home, and raw materials needed to be imported. To increase copper production, one had to first address the issue of copper ore.

Regrettably, the reserves in Europe were genuinely low; otherwise, Chile in the original timeline wouldn’t have gotten rich from exporting copper ore.

This was very discordant for Austria: domestic reserves were insufficient, and importing copper ore from abroad was too distant, adding transportation costs that thinned corporate profit margins.

The Industrial Ministry planned to find copper mines in the African Colony to compensate for the lack of raw materials. Now, although many copper mines had been found, transportation still posed a significant problem.

…

Franz put down the documents and shook his head, saying, “Smelting copper ore locally in Africa is far too aggressive a plan. Now is not the time to develop industry in Africa—not at least until localization has been completed. The African Continent cannot possess industry.”

“Furthermore, would smelting copper ore in Africa definitely reduce costs? I recall that the recent energy reserves report from the Industrial Ministry mentioned the lack of coal mines on the African Continent.”

“Most of the large coal mines we’ve discovered are concentrated in the South African region. If we were to smelt locally, we would still need to transport the ore, which might not be any cheaper than smelting it domestically.”

Undoubtedly, this was another political probe. In recent years, more capitalists who had entered the African Colony for development were no longer satisfied with providing raw materials for domestic use; they wanted to develop industry locally for greater profits.

However, due to inherent inadequacies, the resource distribution on the African Continent was extremely imbalanced, and under the repression of the Vienna Government, they had never succeeded.

Now, these individuals hoped to use the power of the Vienna Government to develop local industries and earn larger benefits.

Such childish political maneuvers could naturally not escape Franz’s eyes. In resource-rich areas like the United States or Australia, it was difficult to suppress local industrial development.

In the African Continent, the situation was altogether different, with over ninety percent of the coal mines concentrated in the South African region. The rest of the regions looking to develop industry would first need to solve the coal supply problem.

This would require building roads, but Austria’s plan for major railways on the African Continent was still slowly proceeding. Although the planned routes had been increased, this was not something that could be finished overnight.

Without the main routes being sorted out, there was even less hope for the branches. Without railway transport for raw materials, industry in Africa naturally couldn’t get off the ground.

Now, seizing the opportunity of the domestic shortage of copper, many were getting restless again; however, they overlooked the general distribution of resources in Africa, something Franz knew better than anyone.

He might not know the specifics of each mine, but which large regions contained what resources was no secret in the future; anyone with even a slight interest could find the information online.

There were indeed areas on the African Continent suitable for industrial development, and the South African region was the prime choice, hardly lacking any resources.

But wasn’t there an ongoing war? Once the war was over, gold would come into play. As soon as significant gold mines appeared, who would still care to invest in other industries?

Capital is always profit-seeking, naturally flowing to areas with high profits. Once gold mining began, resources would be seized, making investment in other industries difficult.

In part, the lack of industrial development in South Africa was precisely because of the abundance of resources: just selling the mines could make one wealthy, so who would be willing to risk investing in industry?

The Industrial Minister Kascin-Qubeck explained with frustration, “Your Majesty, the localization investigation period in the Guinea region is about to end. If we continue to suppress local industrial development, we might draw criticism.

“We are all aware of the resource distribution problem, and those people in the African Continent surely understand these issues too. Yet they still submitted the application, which is mostly likely a probe.”

Even if one or two coal mines are discovered, and they happen to be suitable for industry, at most it could add one or two factories.

“As long as the government doesn’t solve the transportation issue, no matter what they try, it’s impossible to create an industrial system without raw materials. Why should we stop them?”

The African Continent is not just lacking an industrial system, it is utterly impoverished. Not only are raw material resources not in place, even manpower is scarce.

In the sparsely populated African Continent, trying to find hundreds of thousands of workers to establish a large industrial conglomerate that integrates mining and smelting is a cost that would make any capitalist balk.

Franz asked uncertainly, “Do you mean to open up the mining industry, but intentionally set up barriers when constructing railways?

“To prevent direct connections between the locations of raw material production and increase the transportation costs of industrial development?”

If you really do that, I reckon Africa’s industry might as well be finished. It’s not a problem to develop mines; the government will build railways in resource-rich areas to transport the minerals out.

However, these railways would mainly consist of single tracks, and not a comprehensive rail network. Especially between iron and coal mines, there’d be no direct railway connections, suppressing the development of Africa’s native industry from the source.

One has to admit, this method is far more sophisticated than simply forbidding Africa from developing industry. In the future, one could find excuses, for example: the prospecting technology was not adequate, mistakenly estimating the resource reserves.

A mega mine with a hundred million tons of ore reserves might only show a million tons on the reports, clearly not worthy of the government’s attention or planning for railway lines.

Or perhaps: it overlooked technological advancements.

Due to the limitations of the era, the value of the mine was misjudged and the railway construction overlooked, which seems excusable.

…

In the end, it’s all caused by exceptional circumstances, absolutely not the Central Government suppressing the industrial development of the African Continent. If in the end, the industry in the African Continent does not develop, that’s beyond human control.

After several decades, once local integration is complete, and Austria’s rule in the African Continent is deeply rooted, it would not be too late to correct these special historical mistakes.

Minister of Industry Kascin-Qubeck replied, “Yes, Your Majesty. Right now, we have to concentrate on developing our homeland, even if it means the colonies must make sacrifices.”

Kascin-Qubeck emphasized the word “colony” significantly. Being a colony, it naturally could not be compared with the homeland. It was inevitable to have a lower status.

If Austria did not extract resources from its colonies, its economy would not be able to maintain rapid growth. Before the era of free trade arrived, colonies were meant to be sacrificed.

This time, the “mistake” limited by the era is no longer a mistake, and the fault in the construction of Africa’s railway network becomes inevitable.

Franz finally understood why the railways in colonial India were so full of pitfalls—the root of the problem lies in the colonial era.

It’s not that the designers planned unwisely, but that reality needed this imprudence. What looks unreasonable in the future was the optimal choice in this era.

Franz nodded and said, “We must accelerate the construction of colonial railways, take advantage of the asymmetry of information to establish facts on the ground, and avoid drawing public attention.”

The Vienna Government does have a resource distribution map at hand. It’s bound to be imperfect, but it still knows much more than the public.

Industrial development can’t do without coal, and the African Continent’s coal mines are concentrated in the South African region, which means it’s predetermined that the real mistakes in design would also be there.

It’s very simple to achieve this. Just use gold mines as a cover. Giving priority to the development and smelting of gold mines in the railway network while neglecting other areas is understandable.

…

This covert scheme, naturally, has to be kept as secret as possible, and its implementation naturally falls on the Railway Department.

Within the Railway Department, Stein, who received this special order, was dumbfounded. This job was not easy; it was clear that he had to be ready for criticism.

No matter how well-prepared the excuses are, people will still blame the railway designers in the future, and deciding who should take the fall became a difficult problem.