According to the findings of a poll conducted by the association of German Chambers of Commerce and Industry (DIHK), about one fifth of industrial enterprises in Germany had plans to cut production as a result of rising energy prices. Although 17% of businesses have reported that they have been forced to reduce production as a result of the energy crisis, 8% of businesses have reported that they are preparing to shift production. According to Martin Wansleben, the managing director of the association, “the position of our economy is serious – persistent crisis management and faster response are now urgently necessary.” Fifty-nine percent of all businesses reported that they intended to mostly pass on increases in energy costs to their customers, while only thirty-eight percent reported that they were considering investments to boost energy efficiency.
According to the findings of the poll, the effects of the energy crisis are particularly detrimental to the automotive industry. Since the previous survey was conducted in the early summer, there has been a significant increase in the number of automakers (43%) and suppliers (49%), who have classified their current financial situation as challenging. Sixteen percent of automobile manufacturers have already reduced production, while seventeen percent of the same manufacturers claimed they were preparing to move production overseas. The high cost of raw materials and energy was cited as the most significant threat to 95 percent of the enterprises operating in this industry as of right now.
According to data provided by DIHK, the price of energy that producers had to pay in September was 132 percent higher than it had been the previous year. The government and the top economic research institutes in Germany are of the opinion that Germany’s economy will enter a recession as a direct result of the energy crisis in the next year because rising costs will have a negative impact on both output and consumption. Before the conflict in Ukraine broke out, the competitiveness of a great number of industrial enterprises in Germany depended on the low-cost pipeline gas supplied by Russia.
