Industrial production in Germany will continue to decline in 2024, not least because of past energy price spikes. This was stated by the head of the German Industrial Union (BDI), Siegfried Russwurm.
“German industry has not yet recovered from cost and demand shocks, as well as temporarily high energy prices and inflation,”, the press service of the association quoted him as saying. “We expect industrial production in 2024 to fall by 1.5 percent compared to the previous year”, added the head of the BDI.
Germany's GDP has decreased in 2023 compared to the previous year by 0.3%. Also, experts from the German Federal Statistical Office noted at the end of last year a decline in the purchasing power of the population due to rising consumer prices.
Germany is currently gradually transitioning to renewable energy sources, abandoning coal-fired power plants and closing down nuclear power plants. It is planned to achieve complete climate neutrality by 2045. Initially, the transition period relied on Russian energy resources, mainly gas. Germany began to refuse supplies of resources from the Russian Federation after the escalation of the conflict in Ukraine.
According to the results of a survey by the German Chamber of Commerce and Industry (DIHK), published on August 29, 2023, 52% of more than 3, 5 thousand surveyed companies declared “negative or very negative“; the impact on the country's own business of the course chosen by the country's leadership to achieve climate neutrality. According to DIHK Deputy Director General Achim Derks, many German companies are very concerned about “energy supply shortages in the medium and long term” and their doubts about their own competitiveness are “greater than ever”.