Chapter 906 East African Economic Planning Committee

"In order to meet the needs of East African economic development, the East African Planning and Economic Commission was established to coordinate the construction of industry, agriculture, energy, technology, engineering, etc. in the country."

"The main reason for establishing this agency is to formulate the country's medium- and long-term development plan, maintain the stability of development policies, and at the same time design East Africa's independent economic development path more scientifically, coordinate the work of state-owned enterprises and various institutions, and government departments at all levels, formulate production plans, and improve industrial and agricultural production capacity."

In a country like East Africa dominated by state-owned economy and collective economy (mainly agriculture), it is obviously not feasible to rely on Western traditional or capitalist economic development models.

So in October 1895, Ernst formally promoted the establishment of the East African National Planning and Economic Commission, and selected elite troops from various government agencies in East Africa to form this economic policy agency that is very different from the Western world.

The establishment of the East African National Planning and Economic Commission does not mean that East Africa denies the market economy, but is to guide the development of East African state-owned economy and collective economy in a more scientific way.

Of course, the main private economy in East Africa is the royal enterprise, so in fact, it will also comply with government requirements to formulate the development strategy of enterprises in East Africa.

However, for this institution, the nickname of the East African internal government is "Economic Cabinet". After all, it is completely different from the Ministry of Finance. Most of the work is done within the department. Instead, it can directly intervene in the work of all departments related to the national economic field. Ernst is naturally the top leader.

"In the composition of our country's economy, state-owned economy and collective economy occupy a dominant position. Therefore, in order to facilitate the management of state-owned enterprises and collective economy, the Planning Commission is a necessary institution. In the past, our country's economy has been in a state of barbaric development for a long time. The communication and cooperation between various departments and enterprises lack connectivity, which is not conducive to the formulation of national economic policies. Therefore, the task of the East African Planning Commission is to implement the principle of "one chessboard for the national economy", formulate the development direction of the government's economic work tasks, and provide guidance for the development of enterprises and economic groups."

For what Ernst said, many officials in East Africa only felt confused and powerful. After all, there is no precedent in the world.

However, it did not cause much waves. After all, East Africa was also a "planned" economy in the past, and the national development policy was completely decided by Ernst alone.

Of course, Ernst alone certainly does not have this ability. It mainly relies on the think tank team to complete the specific work, and finally Ernst signs and agrees.

So now the East African Planning Committee is actually equivalent to Ernst upgrading the think tank team to a formal government agency. In the case of "changing the soup but not the medicine", everyone naturally does not feel it.

After the establishment of the East African Planning Committee, the power of the Ministry of Finance was greatly reduced, but it is still an important economic department of the government. After all, in theory, the Planning Committee has no real power, and it costs money to do things, and finally the Ministry of Finance has to review and sign for confirmation.

After the establishment of the department, Ernst said: "It will be the turn of the century in a blink of an eye. In four years, it will be the 20th century, which also means the advent of a new era. Therefore, in these four years, the Planning and Economic Committee will take over the formulation of the national economic development strategy, and at the same time be familiar with related work. Formulate the overall goal of my country's economic development before 1900. There is no need to set the tone too high, work pragmatically, and improve the current national economic system."

After all, the Planning and Economic Committee has just been established, so whether it can meet Ernst's requirements remains to be seen, so the four years from 1895 to 1900 are its running-in stage.

It is impossible to let them make detailed plans. First, make a rough development plan, and then observe the effect by 1900, and then make major adjustments and changes.

In Ernst's view, East Africa's planned economy should not be rushed. Although it is easy to achieve results, it is also easy to ignore potential drawbacks.

The people under his command must be familiar with various affairs first, understand the national conditions of the country's economic development, and the development trend of the world economy, and then formulate a relatively scientific development plan according to the specific conditions of East African countries.

This led to the first national development plan formulated by the East African Planning and Economic Commission to be quite conservative:

At least 50 new state-owned enterprises of various types will be established, steel production will exceed 3 million tons (of course, East Africa is more than 2 million tons), cultivated land will exceed 1.5 billion mu, grain production will exceed at least 200 billion (currently more than 117 billion catties), and railways will exceed 70,000 kilometers (30,000 kilometers less than the original plan of the Ministry of Railways)...

Moreover, in some economic fields, the goal setting is quite implicit. After all, in a short period of time, the Planning and Economic Commission does not have a thorough understanding of East Africa's national conditions and cannot grasp detailed data.

So we can only say that we encourage the development of various industries, promote industrial upgrading and transformation, vigorously develop national defense and military industries... and other uncertain topics.

Ernst can understand this. After all, he has no experience, so his requirements are not high. It is estimated that the Planning and Economic Commission will be familiar with the relevant work after four years, and then it will not be as "at a loss" as it is now.

This also makes other government departments in East Africa laugh. After all, the lack of proficiency in work makes the Planning and Economic Commission in East Africa look out of place. The economic development goals it sets are even lower than the plans set by the original government departments at all levels.

Among them is the Ministry of Railways. The original plan designed by the Ministry of Railways was that before 1900, the total mileage of East African railways would exceed 100,000 kilometers. The Planning and Economic Committee cut it down, and directly lost a French national railway mileage.

Of course, the task of the Planning and Economic Committee in the early stage was mainly to run-in and learn, and its economic policy formulation was only of guiding significance. It would be great if the Ministry of Railways could exceed the task.

However, the data of 70,000 kilometers given by the Planning and Economic Committee is not completely unreasonable. Its data is based on the data of East African railway construction in previous years. After all, East African railway construction has peaks and lows. According to their estimates, in the next four years, East African railway construction will hardly reach the scale of the 1970s and 1980s. After all, the outbreak of railway construction in the 1970s and 1980s was due to the economic crisis.

The debate between the two can only be proved by time. Before that, the Ministry of Railways naturally still planned the national railway construction plan according to the original plan.

Therefore, after the establishment of the East African Planning and Economic Committee, between 1895 and 1900, it would hardly have much impact on the economic development of East African countries.

In fact, even without this department, the current East African economy cannot develop too slowly in the big cycle of world economic recovery.

At the end of the 19th century, it was the outbreak period of the Second Industrial Revolution. As long as the overall stability of the country can be maintained, even the current government of the Far Eastern Empire can achieve good political achievements.

In fact, the economies of the Far Eastern countries and East Africa are very similar. That is, the large number of enterprises established by the government during the Westernization Movement are actually state-owned enterprises, and this period is the stage of rapid development of the military industry and other fields of the Far Eastern Empire.

Of course, the Far Eastern Empire government is obviously still a little timid in industrial investment, unlike East Africa, which is all big-handed, which is also closely related to the national conditions of the two countries.

Especially after the Far Eastern War, this can be regarded as one of the turning points of the Far Eastern Empire. After more than ten years of peaceful development, the Far Eastern War also means the resumption of regional turmoil.

East Africa will be in a peaceful and stable state in the next ten years because of the South African War. In this case, East Africa is likely to rapidly narrow the gap in economic size with the Far Eastern Empire.