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Container loading in the port of Hamburg: The German export industry is doing good business, thanks to high demand from China and the USA
Photo: Daniel Reinhardt / dpa
Leading economists predict an economic upswing in Germany as soon as the corona pandemic is under control.
»We expect a strong recovery in the second quarter.
Foreign demand, especially from China and the USA, is already driving the positive development in the industry and is developing very positively, ”said the“ economic approach ”Veronika Grimm in a survey by the dpa news agency.
Katharina Utermöhl from the Allianz Group was also optimistic.
"In the USA, retail sales went up by almost ten percent after the reopening," she said of the dpa.
There are now also the first signs of a spring recovery in the German service sector - even in the catering sector.
The chief economist of the state-owned KfW group Fritzi Köhler-Geib said: "In the next few months it will be important to set the course for a successful upswing."
Marc Schattenberg, an economist at Deutsche Bank, even expects the labor market to pick up in spring.
After seasonal adjustment, the number of unemployed will fall by 12,000 in April, he forecast.
The Federal Employment Agency will publish its April statistics on the labor market next Thursday.
Strong demand from the USA and China for German goods
Despite the ongoing corona lockdown, Germany's economic performance did not collapse in winter.
Above all, the strong demand from China and the USA for local industrial products keeps the economy relatively stable.
While parts of the service industry such as the hotel, catering or event business hardly do any business, industrial companies often have a good order situation.
Many economists expect this division of the economy to continue until the end of the corona crisis.
Organizations like the International Monetary Fund (IMF) or the OECD recently revised their forecasts for the world economy upwards.
For example, the IMF expects global growth of 6.0 percent this year and plus 4.4 percent for 2022.
According to the IMF, the upward trend in the euro zone should not be quite as dynamic: 2021 plus 4.4 percent, 2022 plus 3.8 percent.
However, this would still be a strong recovery after the minus 6.8 percent in the previous year.
However, German economists warn against rashly putting the pandemic aside.
"If we don't take further measures, there will be a 'yo-yo effect'," said the "Wirtschaftweise" Grimm.
“It takes more than the emergency brake to get the infection numbers under control.
It takes progress in vaccination and compulsory testing in the companies, which should be implemented consistently, "said the professor at the University of Erlangen-Nuremberg.
Köhler-Geib called for more emphasis on qualification in the companies.
"Over three million employees and 1.4 million unemployed have no professional qualifications," said the KfW chief economist.
»Qualification is the most promising way to enable employees in the lower wage groups to have higher incomes and to open up further prospects for short-time workers.
clh / dpa
