Germany is losing importance as a place of production of cars. If 5.6 million cars were produced in the German plants in 2012, in 2022 the figure dropped to 3.6 million. In fact, the big German giants such as Volkswagen, BMW, Opel and Mercedes Benz are increasingly producing abroad: from 8.6 million cars in 2012 to over 10 million in 2022. It is advantageous for car manufacturers, given that “Volkswagen, BMW and Mercedes achieved a combined record profit of €49.2 billion last year.” On the other hand, the biggest problems affect the German supply chain of the national plants.
The alarm was sounded by Handelsblatt, who adds that the German “automotive nation” will never return to production figures such as 6 million cars a year, while “the industry is unanimous in saying that much needs to be done to stay above above the four million mark.
The German institute Ifo already sees a deindustrialization of Germany underway as an automotive headquarters, while according to Stefan Bratzel, director of the Center of Automotive Management, we are facing a “drama”.
As reported by the business daily, economists and industry representatives attribute the drop in production in Germany “to high wages, taxes and energy prices” in the country and, therefore, “industry experts predict further relocations”. The boom in electric cars is further exacerbating the trend.
According to forecasts by the market analyst firm “Inovev”, Germany’s production of cars is expected to increase again with a better supply of chips, but it will still remain below 4.2 million until at least 2027.
Even the Vda – German Association of the Automotive Industry expresses concern: “the crises of recent years have ruthlessly exposed Germany’s weaknesses as an industrial location”.
Meanwhile, on the occasion of a conference of the Ig Metall union, 220 works councils declared that on the part of the automotive sector the “level of indifference and irresponsibility towards the national headquarters has reached a new quality”.
Source: Ansa
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