A highly developed industrialized country and the 3rd economic superpower in the world, Germany is placed 1st in economy in Europe. Widely acknowleged as a commodities exporting giant, with over half of its industrial products flowed abroad, Germany ranks 2nd in terms of exporting volume. Nearly 1/3 employers are devoted to the exporting line, whose major exports are automobile, machinery, electrical appliance, transport facilities, chemicals and iron & steel, while, imports involve machinery, electrical appliance, transporting facilities, automobile, gasoline and clothing. Occidental industrialized countries are German major trading partners.

German government pursues such policies as strengthening national finance, diminishing budget deficit, carrying out tax reform, stimulating personal investment, further implementing non-state-owned system, lessening national intervention, giving full play to marketing mechanism function, in order to keep the German economy on the stable rise. In the mean time, effective measures should be taken to facilitate the development of IT and adjust economic structure. Owning to the deficiency of natural resources, Germany is largely dependent on importing in terms of raw materials and energy involving 2/3 primary energy. Heavy industry plays a vital role in German industry, with automobile, machinery-manufacturing, chemical industry, electric gas etc constituting over 40% in the gross value of industry. What are extremely advanced is food, textile and clothing, steel processing, mining, precise instruments, optical and aviation & aerospace industry. Moreover, multitudes of small & medium enterprises are situated in Germany, making the formation of industrial structure well balanced. On account of the exceedingly highly industrialization, agriculture is even well developed, with farming land covering half of German territory and agricultural products able to meet the demand of 80% people nationwide. Among other things, tourism and public transportation are flourishing. Germany is a bear-manufacturing power, whose output ranks ahead worldwide. Last but not least, it’s Germany that is the first country developing the technology of high-speed magnetic trains with success. After the last second of Feb 28th 2002, with German Mark formally stepping down from the historical stage, Euro became the legitimate currency in Germany, one of the first 11 Euro-utilizing countries.

Economic system

Social market economy, that is, the process of economy, is basically adjusted by market in a scattered manner. Attention is just paid to the effective competition. Market economy involves consumption freedom, manipulation freedom, the freedom of selecting carrier & working place and the right of owning personal property. Self-arrangement of remuneration, namely, conditions of working, particularly the amount of remuneration and bonus is prescribed by Trade Union & Employer Union, which is stipulated in constitution. The employers and employees act on their own and are responsible for themselves, regardless of the influence of country, above all, within the boundary of constitution and law. As far as the public services are concerned, federal, couplet with each state and villages & towns, acts as the other party talking over the details about remuneration & bonus. As of the social welfare, annuity insurance & retirement pension, added with medical insurance, unemployment insurance, kid subsidiary and the network of social welfare composed by other important welfare funds, plays a leading role in it. As to the rationality of tax system, it is imperative to adopt progressive incremental tax according to the individual economic capacity and to maneuver the economy in an all-round fashion. Comprehensive manipulation means that the figure of macro-economy, such as the total amount of investment, number of currency, consumption rate, GNP, is affected by some basic conditions. Consequently, it is essential to strive for the stable price, high employment rate and the balance of foreign economy, while the economy is constantly thriving.

Finance

In 2000, the gross surplus of German public finance is 18.8 billion euros, amounting to 0.91% of GDP. The gross revenue of public finance, surrounding federal, state, municipality, EU share and social insurance, added up to 975.581 billion euros, compared with 956.998 billion euros in gross expenditure. On December 2001, the German Federal Bank gold reserve had climbed up to 93.215 billion marks, with gold reserve and gold claims being about 35.005 billion marks. Meanwhile, the reserve and SDR of International Monetary Fund had skyrocketed up to 8.721 billion marks and foreign reserve exceeded 49.489 billion marks. Until June 2001, German foreign loan had been 2.850506 trillion euros and 2.939064 trillion euros in credit.

Major Banks

--Deutsche Bundesbank www.bundebank.de
Deutsche Bundesbank, central bank of Germany, was founded in 1948, the tasks of which are to formulate monetary policy, release currency and regulate foreign exchange & gold reserve. The total assets had been as much as 380.5 billion marks by the end of 1998.

--Deutsche Bank
DB, the largest commercial bank in Germany, was established in 1870. The total assets climbed up to 820 billion dollars after merging Sun Trust Banks on Nov 29th 1998, whose total assets ranked 8th in America. Simultaneously, DB was then the largest commercial bank globally by exceeding Union Bank of Switzerland. In 2001, DB earned the 3rd place on a global scale with its total assets mounting up to 874.77 billion dollars.

--Bayerische Hypo-und Vereinsbank. AG
On July 21st 1997, after Bayerische Vereinsbank and Bayerische Hypothekena und Wechselbank started to join hand in hand, its total assets mounted up to 743 billion marks. Until March 2001, the total assets had been accumulated up to 717.9 billion euros.
--Dresdner Bank AG
Dresdner Bank AG was formed in 1872. Until July 2001, Alliance Group had increased and holding 96% of its shares. Two months later, the total assets had rocketed up to 536 billion euros.
--CommerzBank AG
CommerzBank AG was founded in 1870 and had boasted 354.93 billion dollars in total assets.

Natural Resources

Germany is relatively deficient in natural resources. Despite the rich deposit of hard coal, lignite and salt, Germany is invariably dependent on importing to a tremendous degree in terms of the supply of raw materials and energy. For example, 2/3 primary energy needs to be attained abroad. Natural gas output can appeal to 1/4 domestic demand. Proved reserves of hard coal amounts to 230 billion tons, with recoverable reserves being about 24 billion tons; Lignite reserves are around 94 billion tons; Proved reserves of other minerals: potassium is about 13 billion tons, together with 16 million tons of iron ore, 50 million tons of oil and about 500 billion cubic meters of natural gas. A small amount of uranium can be found in Southeast. Forests cover an area of 10.7 million hectares, accounting for 29% of the area. Waters accounted for 2%.

National Economy

In 2001, German economy rose 0.6%, compared to that of the year 2000, and GNP grew up to 2.064 trillion euros, accounting for 30% in EU. At the same time, price of commodities and unemployment rate climbed by 2.5% and 7.4% respectively, compared with those of last year. In that year, GDP broke through 2.063 trillion euros, and per capita GDP was evaluated around 25 thousand euros. GDP growth rate was 0.6%, with inflation rate 2.7%. In 2001, imports and exports mounted by 2.2% and 6.7% respectively. Labor productivity grew by 0.4%. Domestic capital investment decreased by 4.6%. Private consumption expenditure & non-profit private organizations and public consumption expenditure increased by 3.0% and 2.3%. Surplus of public finance was 18.8 billion euros, accounting for 0.9% of GDP. Total social welfare expenditure for 2000 reached 680.185 billion euros, or about 33% of GDP. Public finance liabilities amounted to 1.2 trillion euros (14,579 euros per capita). In international competition, Germany boasts a series of advantages, such as high productivity, employees with favorable cultural quality, high level of technology, innovative scientists, full range of good infrastructure, social stability, monetary stability (depreciation rate fluctuates in 1%) and reliable political environment.

Industry

Features of German industry can be as focusing on heavy industry, export-oriented, SMEs-dominated, high level of monopoly etc. (1) Focusing on heavy industry. Automobile & machinery manufacturing, chemical, electrical gas etc are pillar industries in Germany, making up 40% of entire industrial productivity. Among other developed industries are food, textile & clothing, steel processing, mining, precision instruments, optical, and aviation & aerospace. (2) Export-oriented. 50% or over 50% of products of major industries are exported to the outside world. (3) Industry mainly composed of SMEs. About 2/3 industrial enterprises hire less than 100 employees. Many SMEs enjoy a higher degree of professionalization, with a higher level of average technology. (4) High level of monopoly. Large enterprises of 1000-odd employees, constituting 2.5% of total industrial enterprises, occupy 40% of industrial employment and more than half of turnover. 2001, the industrial production value exceeded 483.77 billion euros (excluding construction), (accounting for 23.4% of GDP). The number of industrial employers was near about 8.52 million (excluding construction), representing 22% of total domestic employers.

Farming & Stock Raise

Germany features an extremely high level of agricultural mechanization. These years, agriculture has been in adjustment, demonstrating a sign of central tendency. In 2001, there were 447,000 agricultural enterprises (approximately 32% decreased compared with 1991). SMEs-small & medium enterprises play a leading role in Germany, occupying 38.2 hectares of land on average tenure (26.1 hectares in 1991). Forest area was 7.43 million hectares in 1999, with 26.4% of forestry enterprises. A total of 17.1 million hectares of agricultural land existed in 2001, approximately accounting for half of German territory, including 11.8 million hectares of farming land and 706 million hectares of land for food crops. In that year, agricultural, forestry and fishery production value climbed up to 23.25 billion euros, representing 1.13% of GDP, an increase of 5.7% over the previous year. In the years of 1999 and 2000, annual production value of crops went beyond 43.298 billion marks, accounting for 52.6% of agricultural GDP. The output of animal products was 36.514 billion marks, making up 44.3%. Agricultural employers were 987,000 in 2000, accounting for 2.7% of total domestic employment.

Services

The number of employees working in services was 23.514 million, accounting for 64.2% of total employees, including commerce, transportation, telecommunications, banking, insurance, house-rental services, hotel, educational, culture, healthcare and other sectors.

Tourism

Tourism in Germany is widely acclaimed developed, with million upon million tourists traveling in Germany. In 2001, the number of individuals staying overnight was up to 327 million, involving about 90.7 million domestic tourists, and about 16.9 million foreign tourists. In 2000, 54 thousand hotels lay in Germany, with 2.48 million beds, and the hotel industry revenue was estimated to be 44.33 billion marks. About 49.3 million persons traveled outside Germany in 2000.

Public Transportation

Public Transportation in Germany is tremendously developed undoubtedly, acted as a exceedingly important part of domestic economy. Moreover, Roads, waterways and air transport are developed in a comprehensive manner, but mainly dependent on roads that are the densest in the world. In 2000, the total capacity of cargo transport reached 3.871 billion tons, including 77.6% of roads, 7.8% of railway, 6.3% of inland rivers, 6.2% of sea transport, 2.3% of pipelines, 0.06% of aviation. The total number of passengers arrived at 99.82 million, involving 20.1% of railway, 78.7% of highway, and 1.2% of aviation.

Railway

When dated back to 2000, the total length of German railway can be summed up to 44,700 km, with electrified railway accounting for 43%. Simultaneously, 13,731 locomotives, coupled with 13,872 sections of passenger cars and about 190,000 sections of train wagons (including the railway wagon-owned and rented). In addition, passenger volume reached 2.002 billion, while cargo-transporting volume was 294 million tons, and domestic transport volume rose up to 194 million tons—nearly 76-billion ton/ kilometer.

Road

When traced back to 2000, the total length of various kinds of roads mounted up to about 461,000 km, of which was 11,500 km of highways ranking 4th in the world. In the mean time, the number of national registered motor vehicles reached 51.365 million, involving 42.84 million cars and 2.527 million trucks. 3.972 million motor equipped vehicles were registered for the first time in that year, and the volume of road freight was 3.005 billion tons, including 2.901 billion tons in domestic freight and 58.709 billion in passenger transport (including public and private transport).

Water Transportation

Germany boasts over 6,800 km inland waterways, with 270 million tons of river ports throughput. Duisburg is the largest river port. The largest harbor situated in Bremen / Bremerhaven lying on the North Sea, Kiel located on the Baltic Sea, Lu British grams and Rostock. In 2000, Germany features 689 deep-sea merchant vessels, the total tonnage and freight volume of which reached 6.516 million tons and 238 million tons respectively. In 1999, the throughput of national main seaport arrived at 221 million tons-- 73.357 million tons handled in Hamburg harbor. In 1999, the total length of inland waterways amounted to 7,467 km. Then, there existed 5051 various kinds of vessels. In 2000, the freight volume climbed up to 60.9 million tons or 66.5 billion tons/kilometer.

Air Transportation

Air Transportation is well developed in Germany, armed with 357 various aviation enterprises and 1,720 aircrafts for commercial use in 1999. In 2001, the volume of passenger transport and cargo transport are 121 million and 2.2 million tons respectively, while the volume of domestic cargo transport reached 92 thousand tons In 1999, the turnover of airline industry was 30.764 billion marks. A year later, the throughput of cargo at airport reached 2.331 million tons. Frankfurt Airport is one of the world's major airports, the passengers and throughput of which are 49.278 million and 1.583 million tons respectively. The most important airports (in alphabetical order): Berlin-fire Rumsfeld, Berlin-Tegeer, Bremen, Dresden, Dusseldorf, Hamburg, Hanover, Cologne-Bonn, Leipzig, Munich, Nuremberg and Stuttgart.

Pipeline

The total length of pipeline for transferring oil can be estimated to be 2,400 km. In 2000, 89.4 million tons of crud oil transferred via pipeline, involving 20.8 million tons at home—15 billion tons/km.

Foreign Trade

In 2000, German imports amounted to 542.872 billion euros, compared with 597.48 billion euros in exports. Thus, there occurred a surplus of 54.608 billion euros. France is the largest foreign trade partner (508.632 billion and 674.184 euros), followed by the United States, the Netherlands, Britain, Italy, Japan, Belgium, Austria, and Switzerland in terms of import. China ranked 10. with 18.5549 billion euro. When it comes to export, the United States, Britain, Italy, the Netherlands ranked ahead, while China earned the 16th place, with its exports of 9.4591 billion euros.