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Warsaw Palace of Culture (archive photo): Poland is the largest Eastern European buyer of German export goods
Photo: Grzegorz Jakubowski/ dpa
Trade with Russia, Ukraine and Belarus has plummeted as a result of the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
Recently, however, the German economy's business with Eastern and Central Europe has grown significantly.
Exports to the 29 countries increased by 9.8 percent to almost 67 billion euros in the first quarter compared to the same period last year.
This emerges from data from the Eastern Committee of the German economy, which is available to the Reuters news agency.
The value of imports from this region to Germany even increased by 14.6 percent to a good 69.2 billion euros from January to March, mainly due to higher raw material costs.
Corona recovery in the eastern neighbors
"After the corona crisis, the German economy benefited from the sometimes strong economic recovery in these countries," said the deputy chairwoman of the Eastern Committee, Cathrina Claas-Mühlhäuser, on the upward trend.
However, she obviously does not expect it to continue: "After this overall strong first quarter, the war, but also the global supply chain problems, are likely to lead to an economic slowdown in more and more Eastern Committee countries as the year progresses."
In fact, developments could have been even more positive were it not for the Russian war against Ukraine, which began on February 24 and led to heavy sanctions against Moscow and the withdrawal of many German companies.
As a result, exports to the countries involved collapsed:
after Russia in the first quarter by 10 percent, to less than 5.5 billion euros;
to war-torn Ukraine by 7.4 percent to a good 1.1 billion euros;
to Belarus, which is an ally of Russia, by 10.7 percent to around 228 million euros.
"Sanctions, logistics and financing problems and the withdrawal of more and more German companies from these markets are leaving their mark," said Claas-Mühlhäuser.
"The downward trend will continue to accelerate in the coming months." In March alone, exports to Ukraine fell by 46 percent, those to Russia by 58 percent and those to Belarus by almost half.
Three countries in particular were responsible for growth in the first quarter:
Poland, by far the most important customer of the German economy in the East.
Exports there grew in the first quarter by almost 13 percent to more than 21 billion euros.
The Czech Republic – exports there even jumped by 18.6 percent to 13.4 billion euros.
The third largest export market in the East is Hungary.
Exports there grew by 7.3 percent to around 7.5 billion euros.
mamk/Reuters
