Amid intensifying tensions between growing dependency on critical goods and demands for fair competition, Germany's Federal Economy Minister Katherina Reiche (CDU) is travelling to China this week. Accompanied by a business delegation, Reiche intends to explore what her ministry described as "future cooperation potential" during the visit.
As part of her trip from Tuesday to Friday, the minister is scheduled to hold a press conference in Beijing on Wednesday. A visit to the industrial and trade hub of Guangzhou is planned for Thursday. Ahead of her departure, Reiche had indicated that she would assertively represent German economic interests vis-à-vis China while pursuing a solution-oriented approach.
In an interview with the Kölner Stadt-Anzeiger published on Friday, Reiche pointed out that China was redirecting goods into new markets, including the EU, in the wake of its tariff dispute with the United States. "That is leading to a flood of heavily subsidised steel, chemical products, and solar panels," she said.
On the other hand, she added, "I have come to know the Chinese as partners who understand how a balance of interests works. We simply haven't stated our interests clearly enough in the past." The federal government now intends to articulate those interests "calmly and in a solution-oriented manner," she told the newspaper.
Germany's economic relationship with China is widely regarded as complex, as the People's Republic simultaneously serves as a sales market, a competitor, and, critically, a key supplier of strategically important raw materials and products.
According to a study by the Friedrich Naumann Foundation, which has close ties to the FDP, the share of Chinese imports in this area has recently increased further. China's share of rechargeable lithium battery imports stood at 49.7 percent in 2023, by 2025, that figure had risen to 66.5 percent.
The share of Chinese deliveries in antibiotics also grew during the same period. For solar panels, the Chinese share reached "a new record high" and now accounts for 92.6 percent of total import weight. Furthermore, China remains "practically the sole supplier of the rare earth elements praseodymium, neodymium, and samarium, which are essential for the production of high-performance permanent magnets used in electric motors, among other applications."
According to the foundation, these developments run counter to the goals of Germany's official China strategy. The strategy was published by the then Ampel coalition government in July 2023 and calls, among other things, for reducing "dependencies in critical areas."
The document describes China as "simultaneously a partner, competitor, and systemic rival", a characterisation that continues to apply, even as the current black-red coalition government seeks to further reduce existing risks in order to become "more resilient."
Particularly in geopolitically tense times, direct economic dialogue plays a "central role," the president of the German foreign trade association BGA, Dirk Jandura, said on Tuesday. "That is why we expressly welcome the fact that the minister is seeking exchange with the Chinese leadership while at the same time clearly addressing the interests of German industry," he added. "Europe must neither seal itself off nor be naive," Jandura cautioned.
The German Mechanical Engineering Industry Association (VDMA), meanwhile, demanded that Reiche make "unmistakably clear" in China that Europe "will no longer tolerate systematic distortions of competition." "An artificially depressed currency, excessive subsidies, and politically motivated export controls are not minor offences," said VDMA managing director Thilo Brodtmann. "They endanger Europe's industry."
Thyssenkrupp CEO Miguel López, for his part, advocated for Chinese companies to increasingly produce in Europe going forward. German industry had established itself in China 30 years ago, built manufacturing operations there, trained experts, and received "great support" from the Chinese government, he said on ZDF's Morgenmagazin.
"We are now at a point where, in my view, this should also work in the other direction," he added. "We should invite Chinese companies to come to Europe, to produce in Europe, and thereby fulfil their part for society in Europe and in Germany as well."
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