#1411 - Food security

As March arrived, the Great Lakes Province of East Africa entered the rainy season. A torrential downpour descended suddenly, nourishing the lush rice seedlings in the paddy fields. The neat fields were interspersed with rivers, ponds, and lakes, displaying a vibrant scene.

Surrounded by security personnel holding a black umbrella, carefully shielding him, Emperor Ernst, clad in a raincoat, inspected the current state of agricultural development in the Great Lakes region.

The rain was heavy, and even with the umbrella overhead, raindrops still splashed onto the hood of his raincoat, then trickled down the brim.

Ernst nodded, saying, "The agricultural development of the Great Lakes region directly determines the national agricultural situation. Favorable weather is naturally the best. The grain from the entire Great Lakes region is the iron rice bowl for the people of the Empire."

In fact, the climate of the Great Lakes region is one of the most stable in the major agricultural areas of East Africa. There are two rainy seasons throughout the year, with relatively even distribution of rainfall. Moreover, because of its proximity to the Congo Basin, even during the dry season, it is impossible for there to be no rain at all.

Of course, this is the overall situation for most areas of the Great Lakes Province. If it were the northeastern periphery of the province, the rainfall situation would not be so optimistic.

However, the Great Lakes region is not a place that relies solely on rainfall. It is crisscrossed by rivers and dotted with numerous lakes, providing abundant water resources. Even in the event of drought, there would be no shortage of water.

Manfred's next words proved this point. He said with considerable pride, "In order to secure this iron rice bowl for the people of the country, our province has made many efforts over the years."

"As of 1920, our province's cultivated land area is as high as 94 million mu, and in recent years, with the introduction of water diversion irrigation and land management, the cultivated land area has continued to increase. By the end of the Fifth Five-Year Plan, the cultivated land area of the Great Lakes Province exceeding 100 million mu is a certainty."

"Moreover, most of it is irrigated farmland and watered land. The planting area and yield of rice have been steadily ranked first in the country for many years. The yield of important grain crops such as wheat, corn, and soybeans is also among the top in the country."

Nearly 100 million mu of cultivated land accounts for about 30 percent of the area of the Great Lakes Province, which shows that the agriculture of the Great Lakes Province still has great potential for development.

In fact, there are three more provinces around the Great Lakes region, and the total cultivated land around the entire Great Lakes area is close to 400 million mu.

Therefore, Ernst said with great pleasure, "The agriculture of the Great Lakes region, especially in grain planting, accounts for nearly a quarter of the country's total grain output. This is the cornerstone of the Empire's development and cannot be shaken."

"And as an important agricultural production base in the Great Lakes region, the task of the Great Lakes Province is also very heavy, especially in how to coordinate the local ecology and agricultural development, which is a prominent issue."

"Such as wetland protection, soil and water conservation, comprehensive soil management, and so on. In fact, after these years of development, our country's agriculture has long passed the stage of blindly pursuing output."

"Therefore, on this basis, agricultural development should pay more attention to quality, and at the same time, while maintaining agricultural production, take into account the harmonious coexistence of man and nature."

East Africa is a country with surplus agricultural production. Relying on more than 2 billion mu of cultivated land, it is more than enough to maintain the production and life of East Africa, which has a population of less than 200 million.

Moreover, this also takes into account factors such as the improvement of agricultural technology, the increase in the production of pesticides and fertilizers, and the improvement of the quality of agricultural personnel, which affect agricultural yield per mu. Therefore, there is no doubt that even if East Africa no longer expands its cultivated land area, grain output will continue to increase due to other factors.

Ernst said, "Since the last century, international grain prices and market demand have remained at a low level, and although the Empire's population has increased, it also maintains a dynamic balance with current grain production."

"Therefore, continuing to blindly expand the scale of cultivated land is no longer in line with our country's basic national conditions. Under this major premise, the development of ecological agriculture and high-quality agriculture is the way out for East African agriculture in the future."

The reason for mentioning the ecological issue is that in many places in East Africa, after decades of development, related problems have indeed emerged, especially in the areas where grasslands and deserts meet, vegetation destruction has led to the expansion of desert areas.

After all, on the whole, East Africa is a relatively arid country. To the northeast of East Africa is the Somali Desert, to the southwest are the Namib Desert and the Kalahari Desert, and to the north it is adjacent to the Sahara Desert. And these are just deserts, not to mention sandy land, arid grasslands, and other places.

In addition, the development of rainforest boundaries has also encountered problems. Large-scale deforestation has caused soil erosion in forest areas such as the Congo Rainforest, which in turn has led to problems such as increased sediment content in rivers such as the Congo River, the Zambezi River, and the Nile River.

In short, the ecology of many regions in East Africa is relatively fragile.

This is actually understandable. East Africa is no longer the colony with only a million people many years ago, but a super-populated country with a population moving towards 200 million. Currently, only the Far East Empire and India have populations exceeding East Africa.

And such a large population will naturally have a very significant impact on the ecology, especially for East Africa, which has a relatively fragile ecology.

After all, even in the "land of choice" that is the United States, with a population just breaking 100 million, the ecology of the United States is also rapidly disintegrating, and the problem of large-scale dust storms and vegetation destruction is becoming increasingly prominent.

Therefore, East Africa, with a larger population, will only be more serious on this issue, and this also involves the issue of East Africa's destructive development in the past few decades.

Although East Africa has a vast land area, which means that East Africa's population density is actually much smaller than that of Europe and the United States, the problem is obviously not that simple, because East Africa's population distribution is very uneven.

As far as East Africa itself is concerned, in fact, the vast majority of the population lives in the habitable zone in the middle, that is, the so-called monsoon forest zone in East Africa, which can be vaguely understood as the transition zone between grasslands and rainforests, and the area of this region is actually only 4 million square kilometers, which accounts for less than one-third of the total area of East Africa itself.

This is actually comparable to the habitable area of the Far East Empire, which is about 4 to 5 million square kilometers.

Of course, the population of the Far East Empire is more than twice that of East Africa, and the backwardness of the industrial level makes the degree of environmental degradation in the Far East Empire far exceed that of East Africa. The problem of fuel use alone has destroyed many mountains and forests in the Far East Empire.

Thanks to the promotion of energy policies in East Africa in recent years, East African residents can at least use clean energy sources such as coal, natural gas, and electricity. Compared to directly burning firewood, coal is indeed a type of clean energy.

However, in this era, East Africa's environmental problems obviously cannot be compared with the Far East Empire or India. After all, the level of development is different, and the issues considered are also different. East Africa is an industrial country, so it would be more meaningful to compare it with European and American countries.

In Europe and America, the United States has about six million square kilometers of habitable land. However, it should be noted that the area of the United States itself is only over seven million square kilometers.

Europe is even more blessed by nature. In terms of land quality, topography, water resources, and other natural conditions, present-day Europe is the most habitable place in the world.

Of course, habitability is a concept without a unified standard. As for East Africa's so-called habitable land area, there is a lot of exaggeration involved.

However, relative to East Africa's territory, piecing together so much habitable land area is already quite difficult. At least compared to Russia, East Africa's overall natural conditions are much better.

Senior Official Manfred replied, "What Your Majesty said is exactly what our province has been doing in recent years. Although Great Lakes Province is positioned as one of the most important grain production bases in the country, we have also put a lot of effort into ecology and industry."

"Take the scale of cultivated land in our province as an example. Although it ranks among the top in the country, this is already the result of our restraint. In order to protect some wetlands and forests, we have built a series of protected areas. At the same time, in the development of new cultivated land, we have also learned from past experiences and lessons, and value the opinions of professionals."

"If it weren't for this, the cultivated land in our province would have broken through 100 million mu long ago, and even reaching 150 million mu would not be too much of a problem."

Manfred is not exaggerating. In fact, if the land development model of the Far East Empire were followed, Great Lakes Province could build more than 200 million mu of cultivated land.

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Of course, now that grain is not selling at a good price, and the East African central government, out of consideration for food security, will not put all its eggs in one basket. Even if Great Lakes Province wants to expand its cultivated land area in this way, it needs the consent of the East African government.

The so-called food security is not only aimed at foreign countries, but also at East Africa itself. For example, East Africa's five major grain production bases are the Great Lakes Region, the Eastern Highlands Agricultural Region (the non-Great Lakes Region area of the East African Highlands), the Zambezi River mid-lower reaches Agricultural Region, the Southern Agricultural Region, and the Western Agricultural Region.

In addition to these five major grain producing areas, there are also some small grain producing areas. It can be said that in the east, west, south, north, and center of East Africa, large-scale grain producing areas have been built.

After all, it is obviously risky for a country's grain to be completely concentrated in one place. Currently, the grain output of the Great Lakes Region accounts for a quarter of the national total in East Africa, and according to the development potential of the Great Lakes Region, it is fully capable of increasing to 50%.

This is obviously unacceptable to the East African government. If the East African capital were in the Great Lakes Region, it would be easier to control nearly half of the grain production, which would be conducive to the central government controlling the country through grain. But the problem is that Rhein City is not in the Great Lakes Region, so the Great Lakes Region's share of grain production cannot exceed 50% of the national total.

Moreover, East Africa does not need to concentrate cultivated land solely in the Great Lakes Region. Although the agricultural development potential of the Great Lakes Region is very large and the natural conditions are the most superior in East Africa, the specific conditions in other places are actually not bad.

As for the grain output of the Great Lakes Region, the acceptable range for the East African government is that it does not exceed one-third of the total national grain production.

One important reason for this is that East Africa is now a country with a surplus of grain production. The grain output of other regions is sufficient to maintain basic needs within the region. In this situation, it is insignificant for the Great Lakes Region to produce more grain.

Moreover, East Africa is currently intentionally transferring some grain production capacity to the Great Lakes Region, allowing it to undertake the food security tasks of some ecologically fragile areas.

This is also the reason why the cultivated land area of the Great Lakes Region is still expanding. However, this expansion is not disorderly and is always subject to the regulation of the East African government.

In fact, if the Great Lakes Region were allowed to blindly expand the scale of cultivated land and increase grain production without intervention, and completely according to market rules, relying on its superior natural conditions, it would probably "roll over" many grain-producing areas in East Africa.

Just like the international grain market, if a country allows grain from East Africa and the United States to freely enter its domestic market, then the country's agricultural system is basically not far from collapse.

And when the local agricultural system is destroyed, its lifeline will be held in the hands of East Africa or the United States.

In fact, the African continent in the previous life was in this situation. The agriculture of many African countries was completely unable to achieve independent development, but was instead a secondary agricultural system dependent on the suzerain state, only planting cash crops and unable to control independent pricing power. And once it disobeyed the suzerain state, under the sanctions of the suzerain state, it would be possible to fall into a food crisis.

And a food crisis is a very terrifying thing. Once people are not fed, other problems will follow, and the regime will not be far from collapse.

Therefore, in the previous life, countries that could achieve agricultural self-sufficiency had already achieved a very remarkable achievement. And in the previous life, only a few countries on the African continent could achieve this, such as Tanzania, South Africa, and Zambia.

In short, the importance of food security is self-evident, so the East African government cannot allow the disorderly expansion of agriculture in the Great Lakes Region.

Therefore, Ernst emphasized again: "Agriculture is the foundation of the Great Lakes Region, but it is even more important to act according to your capabilities, especially in the current situation of a sluggish international market."

"Moreover, the industry in the Great Lakes Region has also been in a stage of rapid development in recent years. The Great Lakes Region is one of the relatively densely populated areas, but in the past, industrial development was relatively lagging compared with other regions. Now, the industrial belt around the Great Lakes is your opportunity. You must make good use of the local hydropower and mineral resources and catch up with the national average level as soon as possible."

In the early years, it was very easy for East Africa to immigrate to the Great Lakes Region, after all, the land here was fertile and could support a large population. But now there is also a problem, that is, the population is relatively dense, but industrial development is relatively slow. This makes the Great Lakes Region an economic depression in East Africa, especially in terms of per capita income and industrial capacity.

This also means that if East Africa wants to transform from a primary industrial power to a veritable industrial power, it must solve the development problem of the Great Lakes Region. When the economy and industry of the Great Lakes Region are completely developed, the gap between East Africa and other industrial powers in the world will basically no longer exist.