As a victorious country, Romania also sent a team headed by Foreign Minister Barnoske to participate in the London negotiations, but it was just a show. When negotiating with Bulgaria, Romania's share of the spoils had already been agreed. Now.
Sending people there only shows that Romania is also a member of the Balkan Alliance.
Faced with the current favorable situation, the countries in the Balkan League demanded that the Ottoman Empire cede all European territories west of the line from Media to Enez and all islands in the Aegean Sea.
Faced with this situation, the Ottoman government did not dare to agree easily. Because if divided according to this kind of division, the Ottoman Empire would lose all its territories in Europe except for the small area of Istanbul. Living on the lost European territories
There are 6.5 million people of various ethnic groups, including 1.5 million Ottomans. This is the reason why they have been unable to make a decision.
In Romania Edel doesn't care whether Osman can make up his mind or not, it has nothing to do with Romania.
Now he was concerned about whether Romania's economy would be affected by the war. After the armistice officially came into effect, Edel summoned Prime Minister Bretianu to understand the situation.
"Your Highness, this is the recent situation of import and export trade."
Prime Minister Bretianu handed the Crown Prince an investigation report in his office.
Edel took over the report and it looked like. In this report, from October 21, when the war was declared, to November 21, when the war ceased, the total import and export volume of Romania was 43.1 million lei. Among them, the import volume was 20.67 million lei.
Compared with the 21.19 million lei in September, which was not affected, it is not a big impact. This is because Germany, Romania's main machinery importer, used to transport goods by rail, and only a few parts that could not be transported by rail were transported by sea. And resources
The importing country, Russia, is right on the Black Sea. In addition, although Romania declared war, it did not send troops. The Ottomans did not want to provoke Romania. Transportation within the Black Sea was not affected, so the reduction in imports was not obvious.
The export volume was 23.43 million lei, compared with 29.71 million lei in September, a decrease of 6.28 million lei, which still had a considerable impact. The main factor is that Romania’s exports are targeted at wealthy regions such as Western Europe and Southern Europe.
The cost of rail transportation is 5-7 times that of sea transportation. This has caused the prices of Romanian exports of automobiles, petrochemicals, and grain to rise.
Taking the UK as an example, the price of Romanian T-cars has generally increased by about 10 pounds in Europe. The price of Romanian grain has also increased from 8 pounds 6 shillings per meal to 9 pounds 1 shillings. This makes Romanian exports more expensive in Europe.
The competitiveness of various places has dropped a lot. Now, the market share of automobile manufacturers in European countries has increased by 2 percentage points during this period, reaching a share of 31%. And Romania’s traditional grain exports,
It has also been squeezed out of a lot of share by Russia. The same goes for petrochemicals. Petroleum companies such as Shell and Standard have taken a lot of Romania's traditional Italian market. This also makes Smith of Romania Petroleum a little troubled.
After reading the investigation documents, Edel expressed his opinion to Prime Minister Bretianu. "It seems that the economic impact is still considerable."
Prime Minister Bretianu also agreed. "Yes, Your Highness, we should be glad that this war lasted only a short time, otherwise the economic impact would really not be small."
Prime Minister Bretianu went on to talk about other issues. "And our previous ideas about rail transportation were too optimistic."
When Edel heard that there were problems with railway transportation, he couldn't sit still. This was related to Romania's exports during World War I. If there were any problems, it would have a huge impact. He quickly asked, "Is there any problem with railway transportation?"
"
Seeing the anxious expression of the Crown Prince, Prime Minister Bretianu said truthfully even though he did not know the reason. "We did not take the personnel factor into consideration before. In actual railway transportation, due to the lack of professional loading and unloading tools,
, resulting in a large amount of goods piled up in the freight yard of the railway station. Later, we improved the level of loading and unloading by adding more loading and unloading workers. Although the efficiency improved in a short time, the cost increased a lot. And in the later period, the loading and unloading
The level is still slowly declining.”
After hearing the Prime Minister's words, Eder realized that he had neglected to consider one link. It seemed that he had to solve the loading and unloading problem of large-volume railway transportation as soon as possible.
In fact, the loading and unloading problem is much more serious than Edel thought. Take Constanta, the largest port in Romania, as an example. With a large number of gantry cranes, cranes, transport belts, trucks and other professional loading and unloading tools, manual work has been completely abandoned.
Loading and unloading issues. It can load and unload 1,500 tons of cargo and transport 800 tons of oil per hour.
Railway transportation only has a small number of specialized loading and unloading tools. Under normal conditions, it can handle 500 tons of cargo loading and unloading and 300 tons of oil transportation per hour. Romania previously recruited 4,000 additional stevedores to ensure the transportation of goods on the railway.
.This makes the already high-cost railway transportation even worse and increases their cost problems.
After thinking for a moment, Eder asked Prime Minister Bretianu, "Has the transportation department considered improving the loading and unloading of the railway?"
Bretianu didn’t understand why the Crown Prince was so concerned about the issue of mass railway transportation, but he still answered truthfully. “The transportation department has not considered it before, but I will ask them to come up with such a plan when I go back. I don’t know.
How far does Your Highness want to improve railway transportation?”
After making some calculations in his mind, Edel told Prime Minister Bretianu, "I hope that the railway can fully satisfy Romania's exports."
The Prime Minister was shocked when he heard the Crown Prince's request. This was to completely rebuild the port of Constanta, and it must be a completely land-based port. Prime Minister Bretianu did not think much and immediately retorted. "Your Highness,
Now the Romanian railway cannot meet the requirements you mentioned. Our previous situation can only be achieved in a short period of time. This will cause too much damage to the railway in the long term."
After hearing what Prime Minister Bretianu said, Edel subconsciously asked, "How about we upgrade the railway?"
Prime Minister Bretianu spread his hands and said, "Your Highness, the financial situation does not allow it. We can only increase the loading and unloading speed on the existing rail transportation. Now it seems that 1,200 tons of shipments per hour is the maximum limit.
Already."
After hearing the Prime Minister's words, Edel himself knew that he had said something stupid. Now that Romania's finances have just improved, it is only possible to expand the railway after World War I.
After Edel eased his embarrassment and continued to chat with the Prime Minister for a few words, the Prime Minister also left with a wink.
A few days later, the Prime Minister came to Edel with a railway expansion plan made by the transportation department. Edel saw that the plan listed gantry cranes, cranes, transmission pipelines and other equipment, which required a total of 1,400
The expense of Wan Lei could not help but frown.
After seeing this, Prime Minister Bretianu explained to the Crown Prince, "These are calculated expenses and everything is reasonable."
Edel took a look, picked up the pen and signed the words of agreement on it.
Romania's railway freight expansion plan officially started after Eder signed it. According to the plan, the railway department will expand freight capacity at railway stations in several important cities such as Bucharest, Constanta, Ploiesti, and Iasi. The construction period is nine months
After completion, it will meet 75% of Romania's export volume and can be transported by rail.
