After a simple lecture by the management staff, the assigned work tasks begin.
As for the Viscount Outlets, he disappeared from everyone's sight except for his appearance at the welcome banquet. It made a lot of guys who wanted to hug their thighs feel sad.
In this regard, Yamani was not disappointed. The gap between status and status is too big, and they don't have the talent of the sky and the latitude.
The most important thing is that Yamani will not flatter, and naturally he does not want others to flatter.
Not to mention the high-ranking lord, even the management personnel responsible for the assignment work are surrounded by a large group, and they can't wait to follow the saddle and horses at all times.
Facts have proved that flattery also requires talent, not everyone can do it. Blindly going up to get close, maybe the flattery didn't get photographed, but it was photographed on the horse's hoof.
Looking at the final result, you can see that a certain unlucky person used half-baked Austrian language to get close, but the wrong wording made the management furious and almost got kicked out.
There is no way, the people of Shinra may not be very artistic, but there is one advantage, that is - "rigorous".
The lords were all born in the military, and when they managed their territories, they inevitably brought in some military styles.
Unlike ordinary lords with occupations, all laborers are paid by the lord, so Yamani directly enjoys semi-military treatment.
Apart from the lack of military training, the management model is directly borrowed from the military model. To put it simply: do what you want, don't ask about other things, and don't need to worry about it.
With reprimands from managers, Yamani started the day's work. There is nothing unbalanced, and it is inevitable that you will be scolded at work, especially if it is not yourself who is being scolded, then you will not feel it.
I don't know if it was good luck or bad luck, but Yamani's team was assigned to the road construction army.
This means that from now on, they will spend a long time in the wild.
"Poisonous worms and beasts", thinking of the propaganda of the domestic media, an ominous premonition arises in Yamani's heart.
Just looking at the guards with live ammunition, everyone decisively swallowed their refusal. Theory is impossible, everyone is a good young man who loves to work.
In fact, Yamani thinks too much. This is the African continent. Without the protection of the army, it is difficult for ordinary people to survive in the wild.
Perhaps in the coastal areas, lions, elephants, crocodiles and other beasts have all disappeared; but in the inland areas, these beasts that are about to become protected animals are still the overlords of the jungle.
Because of the vast area and sparse population, even if the noble lords gave full play to their hunting talents, they could not avoid slipping through the net.
In the African continent, labor is very precious, and it would feel distressing if a Viscount of Outlets died. After all, laborers also need to pay pensions.
When they arrived at the construction site, everyone was a little dumbfounded.
Is this still the "Wild Continent" in my impression
I saw a row of construction machinery appearing in front of everyone. Yamani only knew excavators. Other machinery felt both familiar and unfamiliar.
Shocked by shock, there is still work to be done. Compared to continental Europe, the African economy is indeed very backward. But economic backwardness does not mean that productivity must be backward.
Essentially, it's a question of money. As long as you have money in your pocket, things in Europe can also be bought here, but they are "a little bit" more expensive.
Yamani can now be sure that the recruitment hype isn't all lies. At least one thing is certain, that is, there is really no need to work overtime.
There is no large-scale lighting equipment on the entire construction site. Even if you want to work overtime at night, it is impossible to do so.
"Work at sunrise, rest at sunset".
The way of work and rest that completely follows the laws of nature has been difficult for ordinary people to enjoy since human beings entered the industrial age.
In a sense, Yamani and others are lucky. If the territory does not produce coal, there will be no coal mines within a radius of hundreds of miles, resulting in high power generation costs. Otherwise, don’t work overtime and dream!
…
The thoughts of the workers, the Viscount Outlets does not care, and now he is worrying about the problem of the railway.
Because of its geographical location, the Outlets Viscounty perfectly missed the main artery of government planning.
Needless to say, they manage their own territory, and the central government doesn't even collect taxes, so naturally they have no obligation to solve the traffic problem for them.
Of course, this "no tax" is limited to direct taxes within the territory, and the central government still has to collect taxes in the process of commodity trading and circulation.
In theory, as long as it is self-sufficient. If you don't buy goods from the outside world and don't sell products to the outside world, you can really pay no taxes.
In fact, nature does not exist. If you really do not trade with the outside world, you will have to return to the primitive society.
The rights and obligations are equal, and the central government does not directly collect taxes from the territory, and is also exempted from the administrative management and infrastructure investment obligations of the territory.
When planning the main railway line, it is natural to have a reasonable approach. In fact, even if you are lucky, if you encounter the main line passing through the territory, the noble lord will be able to sit back and enjoy it.
Everyone knows that the main line of African railways is a loss-making business. For strategic needs, Vienna must repair the main line, but it does not mean that there are many trains.
In order to reduce operating costs, reducing the number of trains on loss-making lines is a basic operation. If there is a railway without a train skin, it is better not to have it, so as not to panic.
In the end, these expenses must be shared by the central government and local lords. So the African Railway Company, which is responsible for building the African railway network, has been a joint venture between the lord and the central government from the very beginning.
Including the Viscount of the Outlets, all subscribed for the shares. In return, the main line has reserved an interface for him, so that a branch railway can be built to connect with the main line.
Of course, this is not only a matter of his own family, but also the surrounding lords. "Whoever benefits, whoever pays" is a matter of course.
In order to build the branch railway, the Viscount Outlets and the surrounding colleagues also set up a railway company.
The main line is not profitable, let alone the branch line. The railway shares that everyone is competing for in other places have become a hot potato here.
The more shares you get, the more money you need to lose in the future. As for profit, that's something you can't even think about.
It's not that the Viscount Outlets is understated, it's just that the population of the African continent is too small. Take one's own territory as an example, and the number of laborers is over 10,000.
Dozens of nobles in partnership, the best developed territory, with a population of no more than 50,000. Together, everyone's territory exceeds 50,000 square kilometers, and the population is less than 200,000.
Two hundred thousand people are divided into dozens of stations, a proper inter-village railway. If you want to make money from the railway, it is estimated that the population will have to increase by at least 30 times.
That's nearly half the population of the African continent. How long does it take for Shinra to realize the achievements of more than 30 years of operating the African continent
No matter how much the railway company loses, in order for its own products to be shipped out, the railway must be repaired.
The key is the investment in building railways. No matter how high the maintenance costs are in the later period, it is cheaper than transporting materials by carriage. In the long run, it is still profitable overall.
In fact, it is not that everyone has not thought about throwing the branch railways under the management of the central government and paying for it by themselves.
However, no matter how good the plan is, it requires the cooperation of others. The Vienna government is also afraid of goods that are destined to lose money.
Inter-village buses will lose money, and inter-village railways will lose even more. Although the population is small, the journey is not short at all.
If the entire African continent's railway network were to be built, the operating costs would be higher than the combined railway network of the entire European continent.
If it really took over the money-losing business of the "inter-village railway", then the tax that the Vienna government received from Africa every year would not necessarily be enough.
Even so, it's possible to contribute to a thankless effort. A series of problems such as "expensive charges", "few trains" and "delay" can make the people scold the Vienna government to the point of doubting their lives.
From Vienna's standpoint, control of the main railway lines means control of the African railway network. As for the issue of the branch railway, let the nobles handle it themselves!
Slow down, slow down, sooner or later it can be done. When the original time and space Americans developed the west, the problem was more serious than this. The infrastructure construction was also completed, and there was no reason why Shinra could not come up with it.
The operating cost is high, and it is a big deal to send a few cars less. The nobles manage the railway company by themselves, and they can fill up a wagon full of goods before setting off. Scientific, rigorous, and you don't need to worry about someone blaming it.
Deep down in his heart, Viscount Outlets envied his noble colleagues downstream more than once. Although they are located in the Niger River Basin, they can rely on the river for development, but he can only work hard to repair the railway.
The downstream channel is deep and wide enough to be navigable, but the upstream is a tragedy. The small river ditches in Otrenborg are not only turbulent, but also very unstable. Floods in summer and creeks in winter.
There is no way, the road is chosen by his father. Back then, when a small gold mine was discovered, I tried to drag the relationship and set the fief to its current position.
As a result, the king at the beginning, but bronze at the end. Gold mines do exist, but the reserves are very impressive. Mining less than half a year, it was declared cool.
Not to mention making money, even the cost has not been recovered. Once still in the African aristocratic circle, there was a lot of uproar.
To paraphrase the headline of the newspaper, it was "A Territory Deep in the Jungle". After many years of loneliness, it was not until the end of the European War, when the fiefdom nobles were flying all over the sky, that Ortlenburg welcomed its current neighbor.
Of course, being remote also has its benefits. After other people's titles were promoted, their territories were all in the east and the west.
If you want to gather together, you must find ways to find someone to replace. As long as the family in the middle doesn't agree, there's no drama.
The Viscount of Outlets doesn't have this kind of trouble anymore. In the past, the surrounding area was unoccupied land, and it was enough to just draw a piece of it.
Not only is the territory concentrated, but the area is also very large. If in the economically developed coastal areas, the Viscounty could have half the area it is now, it would be a blessing from God.
Whether it is a loss or an advantage, no one will be able to figure out this question for a while.
For the issue of share distribution, everyone has discussed it many times. For many days in a row, the wireless telegraph of the Viscount Outlet, thinking that it was on hormones, kept beeping.
This was a by-product of the war, a breakthrough in radio technology at the end of the European War, capable of communicating hundreds of kilometers away. A few days after the army was equipped, the war was over.
In order to strengthen the control of the African continent, but also in order not to waste resources. After the Great Disarmament, Franz distributed the surplus radio stations as bounties to those of merit.
Perhaps the radio station does not need to pay communication fees, and this thing soon became a tool for the nobles to discuss, chat, and brag.
Putting down the telegram in his hand, the Viscount Outlets put out his thoughts of starting the railway immediately. Share distribution is only one aspect, the key is the difficulty of financing now.
There was no way. After the labor was obtained, many people started to pay attention to the railway. They all ran to apply for loans, and the Royal Bank was also worried.
Unless the economic crisis is over, and the Holy Roman Empire's financial community will act together, no one will be able to raise funds for the construction of hundreds of thousands of kilometers of railways.
Even the start-up capital is an astronomical sum.
If there is no way to repair the railway, it does not mean that it will not be repaired. There is no need for an appointment, everyone is doing the preparatory work, and some people have even started work.
After all, how the shares of the railway company are allocated is mainly related to the later operation, and at most, partial series construction should be done.
For the specific railway construction, it must be the road of whose territory, and who is responsible for paying for the repair, don't expect to be able to take advantage of it.
There is no need to worry about someone making trouble. The constitution stipulates that all citizens must support infrastructure construction, and the noble lords are no exception.
In the event of a dispute, the Governor's Office will come forward to coordinate. The real problem that needs to be solved is money.
After knocking on the table, the Viscount Outlets instructed the administrative officer: "Don't stop the road construction, the railway investment is too big, and if you can't raise enough funds for a while, then build the road first.
With the current income of the territory and bank loans, it should not be a problem to support it for a year. When the economic crisis passed, the funding problem was solved. "
It can be seen that the Viscount Outlets is very contradictory.
On the one hand, they want the economic crisis to last longer, so as to attract immigrants from the mainland;
Who keeps Royal Bank's construction loan interest low
The annual interest of only 2 points is approximately equal to no interest. You must know that ordinary commercial bank loans have more than two points of handling fees.
In fact, the conditions in Ortlenburg are quite good. Although it is a little remote, the land is fertile and water resources are relatively abundant.
Colleagues in the interior of North Africa and East Africa are even more hard-pressed. Now they are busy building reservoirs, and they have no time to think about railways.
According to the construction goals of Africa issued by the Vienna government, in order to solve the problem of insufficient water resources, the reservoirs planned to be built alone are as high as 180,000.
Including Otlenburg, there is also a reservoir plan. If the Viscount Outlets wants to build a power station, the reservoir is an essential project.
But that's a question for the future, and it doesn't need to think so much right now. Anyway, with such a small population, gas lamps and oil lamps are fine. The one that currently needs electricity is the Lord's Mansion.
"Okay, Your Excellency. Just with the arrival of the laborers, the balance of men and women in the territory was completely broken.
If no measures are taken, there will be many security disputes in the future, which may affect the morale of the people in the territory. "
Administrative Officer Martin reminded.
Workers are ordinary people too. As long as it is a human being, there are various emotions and six desires, and the ratio of males and females is seriously imbalanced, and problems are inevitable.
Rubbing his forehead, the Viscount Outlet fell into deep thought. After a long while, he slowly said: "Then first strengthen the management of labor, and first adopt a completely closed militarized management.
It is said that there are also female workers in this labor dispatch. I will mobilize domestic relations and find a way to get a group to come. "
It's not that the Outlet Viscount deliberately ignores the problem of the imbalance between men and women, but the main reason is that infrastructure construction is all heavy physical work, and naturally the male worker with stronger physical strength is the first choice.
…