Tea Industry Development

Ernst paid a visit to the weapons and equipment testing ground at Kidungda Mountain. Overall, he had mainly inspected the tests of various weapons and equipment. As for the Military Vehicle Research Institute, it was basically an empty shell at present, though that was understandable during the early stages of the automobile industry. Thus, in less than a day, Ernst had returned to First Town.

Finance Minister Von der Leyen provided Ernst with a list concerning the tea industry. Over the past few years, tea had developed into one of East Africa's major industries.

"In 1879, East African tea production ranked second only to the Far East Empire and India. But by 1882, our tea exports had risen to third place in the world for the first time. Last year, our industry's exports ranked behind only the Indian tea regions and the Far East tea regions. Production reached over 22,000 tonnes, of which roughly 11,000 tonnes were exported. The Far East Empire's output should have been around 100,000 tonnes, while India's was over 20,000 tonnes. Our tea was mainly sold to Germany, Eastern Europe, the Mediterranean coast, including North Africa, and the Middle Eastern region."

Most of East Africa's increased tea exports had come with the support of the Hohenzollern Conglomerate. Central and Eastern Europe did not share the British fondness for tea, nor did it possess premium tea-producing regions like India. Therefore, expanding the market required advertising in the German territories and cooperation with distributors. Meanwhile, the Far East Empire's tea export trade was largely monopolized by Britain. Of course, mainland Britain was also the largest consumer market for imported tea.

Overall, East African tea quality still could not compete with the tea-producing regions of those first two countries, but each had its own strengths and weaknesses. East African