Status: 11/03/2022 3:21 p.m
Top managers accompany Chancellor Scholz on his trip to China. Other economic giants are missing from the delegation. How much business with the country is still appropriate is a matter of controversy in corporations and associations.
The trip to China by Chancellor Olaf Scholz and a business delegation is not only controversial in the federal government. The relationship with China is also the subject of heated debate in business. Entrepreneurs and managers conduct political discussions as confidentially as possible and without a drastic choice of words. However, two groups can be identified. On the one hand there are often very large companies that are largely dependent on business with China. Their managers argue for further involvement. On the other hand there are trade associations. They make it clear that they want to reintroduce the German China business.
“Dependencies make us vulnerable to blackmail”
This became clear on Tuesday evening at the Hessian Entrepreneurs’ Day in Wiesbaden. “As globally active entrepreneurs, we know exactly: Dependence on individual countries makes us vulnerable to blackmail,” said the Hessian entrepreneur president Wolf Matthias Mang, “There are not only China, Russia and the USA, but many other interesting countries. Reshaping globalization means to be more creative again”. Mang’s family company, Oechsler AG, is itself represented in China.
On the other hand, Jan Rinnert, CEO of Heraeus Holding in Hanau, had a different focus. “It is important that we continue to do business with China,” said Rinnert. There is an ambivalent relationship between the West and China. “No one will deny that China is developing for the benefit of the people there,” said the manager, whose group operates 22 subsidiaries in China.
BASF, VW and BMW are traveling with us
Similar to Rinnert, managers at the chemical group BASF are committed to further business with China. BASF is currently working through a ten billion euro investment in China. Siemens is also expanding its China business. The CEOs of both companies are accompanying Chancellor Scholz on his trip, as are the bosses of VW and BMW, who sell most of their cars in China. The business delegation also includes the head of Deutsche Bank and the Merck CEO. Also there are Hipp, Bayer, Wacker and BioNTech.
According to a report in the “Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung”, however, Mercedes-Benz boss Ola Källenius and the CEO of the split-off DaimlerTruck AG, Martin Daum, have no time. The CEOs of the automotive suppliers Bosch, Continental and Schaeffler are also not taking part. The bosses of the technology companies Infineon, SAP and Thyssen-Krupp and those of the logistics companies Hapag-Lloyd and Deutsche Post are also staying away.
VDMA misses equal opportunities
The Association of German Machinery and Plant Builders (VDMA) focuses on fundamental national considerations: “The potential of the Chinese market should be used, but at the same time dangerous dependencies that could limit Germany’s and Europe’s ability to act politically should be reduced,” says a statement by the VDMA. German companies are often treated badly in China; at least worse than Chinese in Germany. The Federation of German Industries (BDI) has already made a similar statement.
Jürgen Matthes from the German Economic Institute (IW) wrote about the planned minority interest of a Chinese state-owned company in a container terminal in the port of Hamburg: “The matter casts a problematic light on the great dependency of individual German companies on China”. The IW is financed by business associations.