Production at Germany’s steel fabricators last year dropped by 3.3% compared with 2022, Kallanish hears from their association, WSM. Order intake fell by 2.7%.
The decline in production accelerated throughout the year, with the fourth quarter down 5.9% on-year and down 5.4% on-quarter. However, WSM also points to some alleviation seen in December, which saw output drop only 2.5% on December 2022. It says that some primary processors, such as re-rollers, managed to catch up somewhat, and, notably, the defence industry was a good performer.
With some cautious optimism, the association therefore believes the bottom was reached at the end of the year.
Still, industrial activity in German has far from resurfaced this year so far, and WSM finds that many of the causes are home-made. In contrast to the production drop in Germany, France showed a slight increase, and Turkish output rose by as much as 10%, it notes.
The association recently commissioned a poll among its members, in which 44% of companies reported declining business activity in 2024 so far. WSM says that other countries offer better conditions in many respects, making German companies inclined to invest abroad. In terms of power prices, for example, costs in Germany are one third above those in France, and double those of the USA.
Another recurring issue is the “bureaucratic monster” of paperwork, inconvenient procedures from authorities, slow approvals for construction, and unrealistic regulations, WSM notes. This is a complaint heard increasingly from German industries (see Kallanish passim).
Christian Koehl Germany
