Iringa City.

As an ordinary city with little presence in East Africa, the exploration of industrial development by the Iringa city government during the second Five-Year Plan was rather challenging.

Iringa City has almost no special resources; although there are some small-scale mineral resources, they currently have no development value.

Therefore, the Iringa city government has no clear direction on how to develop industry. For this reason, Mayor Randall convened a special meeting to find a path for industrial development in the city.

Randall first set the tone by saying: "Currently, industrial construction nationwide is in full swing. During the first Five-Year Plan, our city achieved remarkable results by establishing basic industries such as flour processing, cotton spinning, and oil pressing. However, during the second Five-Year Plan, it is impossible for us to continue achieving success in this lane because almost all towns across the country are focused on these primary industries."

"This has led to the rapid development of our country’s industry during the first Five-Year Plan because many gaps in various fields were filled in. Continuing this approach during the second Five-Year Plan is clearly not conducive to the competition of our city’s industry with other cities."

"The city government’s funds are limited, and most of the national industrial construction funds have been allocated to central or provincial state-owned enterprises, concentrated in large cities. Without strong support from central finances, we in Iringa can only prioritize the development of some industries that we excel in and that have low barriers to entry."

"Our city’s main crops are wheat and tobacco, and other crops can almost be ignored. However, these two crops are too common in East Africa, and Iringa City is not a major industrial or mining city. This means that industrial development in our city is challenging, especially in heavy industry where our city has a very weak foundation. So everyone has to think of ways to continue increasing our city’s industrial scale based on the first Five-Year Plan."

In response to the mayor’s words, the officials of Iringa city government also felt headache. During the first Five-Year Plan, industrial development was relatively easy; as long as they followed the template, most towns could achieve good industrial development achievements.

But the second Five-Year Plan is obviously different from the first. One thing must be clear—that before the first Five-Year Plan, most cities in East Africa also had industrial accumulation, and during the first Five-Year Plan, led by the central government, each town achieved the integration of their local industrial resources.

Some towns lacked important resources for industrial development, but regardless of how bad the conditions were, developing primary food processing and agricultural product processing was not a problem.

And during the first Five-Year Plan, the resources of these industries were integrated to a certain extent, greatly enhancing the nationwide industrial scale in East Africa. However, this also requires that industrial development during the second Five-Year Plan must find a new path.

With Randall’s speech, the officials of the Iringa city government fell into deep thought, which obviously had a certain effect.

The director of the Industrial and Commercial Bureau in Iringa, Hermes, said: "Mayor, I have a humble opinion about industrial development; we may have been too trapped in the misconception of resources for industrial development."

Hearing Hermes say this, it naturally piqued Randall’s interest. He said: "Feel free to speak; as long as it can help improve our city’s industrial standards, no matter how the idea is, it can be used for reference."

With Randall’s approval, Hermes organized his thoughts and then said: "In the past, when we considered industrial development, we have either focused too much on the support of higher-level governments or on our city’s advantageous resources. But the problem is, in East Africa, even within our province, Iringa may not be in a leading position. Therefore, the development of our city cannot overly rely on policies and support. At the same time, Iringa lacks the mineral resources needed for industrial development, which also means we cannot develop based on mineral resources like other cities."

Iringa City ranks only in the middle to upper levels in terms of industrial development among the more than 600 cities in East Africa. It ranks around 200th, making it difficult to attract the attention of the East African Government. Iringa has a relatively advanced position mainly due to its early development and because it is along the Central Railway.

Hermes continued: "Therefore, the development experiences of other cities in East Africa, especially those with strong industries, do not necessarily suit us."

"Take transportation conditions as an example. Although our city also has a railway, and it’s a main line, our city is just an ordinary city on the Central Railway, not a transportation hub. So the development path of New Frankfurt and our provincial capital Dodoma City is obviously not suitable for Iringa. Moreover, our city is not a coastal city, which inevitably restricts our economic development."

"As for mineral resources, it’s needless to say. Our city has no coal mines or iron mines, nor does it have other relatively important mineral resources. Thus, industrial and mining cities such as Mbea City developed based on mining resources and became our country’s earliest heavy industrial base."

"So if our city wants to develop, it can’t follow conventional paths. We cannot compete with those cities."

Randall nodded and said: "What you said, we naturally understand as well. The question is, how to develop if not by the conventional road?"

Hermes slowly said: "In the past, our country emphasized the development of heavy industry and defense industry, and light industry has not been highly regarded. Although there have been significant advancements in light industry during the second Five-Year Plan, I believe there is great potential and still a lot of room for growth."

"Hermes, your suggestion is to develop light industry. But this is what the central government is also doing during the second Five-Year Plan, isn’t it? Our city has already made arrangements for light industry during the second Five-Year Plan, upgrading state-run flour mills, cotton textile factories, cigarette factories, etc." someone countered.

In response to others’ doubts, Hermes shook his head and said: "Such a degree of industrialization is completely insufficient. Light industry cannot be settled by merely having a few factories related to clothing, food, housing, and transportation."

"Take flour mills, for example. I specifically learned about our city’s flour processing enterprises; they can only produce the most basic flour products. However, there are many industries related to flour. Europe illustrates this best, with numerous bakeries and other industries like biscuits and pastries that all rely on flour. Some factories already achieve large-scale production, so we can completely extend from flour mills to other light industry categories. Bread might not work, but biscuit and some easy-to-store pastries can absolutely have related factories set up."

Bread is the most important staple food in Europe, but in East Africa, the situation has changed significantly. In East Africa, the variety of daily flour-based foods has become diverse, with bread, steamed buns, flatbreads, pancakes, and roasted cakes coexisting. Therefore, Hermes is not very interested in bread production, as it is not as marketable in East Africa as it is in Europe and America.

"In this way, the industrial chain expands, and the industry naturally grows. Take biscuits as a product, for example. The market potential is quite good; they are long-lasting, easy to transport, and taste good. Our city can certainly establish related food enterprises with not much investment required."

Randall nodded and said: "That’s reasonable. We in East Africa also have biscuit production enterprises, but the types and quantities available on the market are few. There is indeed room for development, so the biscuit industry is a relatively safe industry."

Hermes said: "That’s right. Currently, in our country’s industrialized food processing sector, most focus is on the primary stage. Many agricultural products are directly exported after primary processing, while the field of end-consumer goods remains a blue ocean. If our city can use this as a focus, it would be very beneficial for our city’s industrial development."

"People’s needs are diverse; everyone has different preferences, whereas our country’s food industry suffers from serious homogenization. If our city can develop products that meet the needs of our nation’s citizens based on our domestic market demand, then sales would naturally be unproblematic. By enhancing food ingredients and taste, our products will become more popular, we will be able to capture more market share, and propel the development of our city’s industry."