BERLINE—Germany’s top industry groups sent a dire warning over the health of Europe’s largest economy to Berlin on Wednesday as businesses planned nationwide protests to highlight the need for reform.
The rallies under the banner “SOS, Distress Signal Day” come weeks ahead of Feb. 23 elections and after two years in which the world’s third biggest economy has shrunk.
“Companies in Germany are struggling with increasingly poor conditions for competition,” the heads of the BDA, BDI, DIHK and ZDH groups said in a joint statement.
After years of industry warnings about Germany’s growing structural challenges, “it is time to act”, they said, warning of more challenges ahead after US President Donald Trump took office.
Germany’s economy has been hammered by high energy costs, a manufacturing slowdown and weak demand for its crucial exports in China and elsewhere, shrinking in 2024 for the second straight year.
The associations said they had made numerous proposals to support business but “little has happened” under Chancellor Olaf Scholz, who heads a minority government since his three-party coalition collapsed in November. AFP