The German magazine Der Spiegel reports on new problems in the German economy: first, two years of the Covid-19 pandemic, then an energy crisis amid the conflict in Ukraine, now a record dry summer with record low water levels in the country’s river arteries.
More than two years of the coronavirus pandemic, ongoing conflict across Europe – and, as if that weren’t enough, a record dry summer with record low water levels on German waterways, writes Der Spiegel. Already strained supply chains threaten to break as bottlenecks on Germany’s rivers dwindle. Coal and oil can now only be transported across the Rhine in much smaller quantities, if at all.
“Many jobs here depend on the water level” – about half of the industrial goods in the region are delivered by waterways. Chemical parks, steel mills, energy companies are located along the Rhine and need barges because they carry most of their raw materials, said Oke Hamann, managing director of the Chamber of Commerce and Industry (IHK) on the Lower Rhine.
The magazine recalls that in 2018, the drought cost Germany 0.4 percent of its production. The Federation of German Industry (BDI) is also sounding the alarm.
“Persistent droughts and low water levels threaten the security of supply for the industry,” warns Holger Loesch, deputy general manager of BDI.
It is only a matter of time before plants in the chemical or steel industries are closed and mineral oils and building materials no longer reach their destination. This can result in tight delivery schedules, reduced production or even downtime and part-time work, concludes Der Spiegel.
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