(29 Jan 2025)
RESTRICTION SUMMARY:
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Berlin – 29 January 2025
1. German economy minister Robert Habeck arriving
2. Photographer
3. SOUNDBITE (German) Robert Habeck, German Economy Minister:
"Overall, Germany is stuck in stagnation. We are reducing the forecast for economic growth from 1.1% to 0.3%. There are three main reasons for this. Firstly, the growth initiative, the economic policy program of the coalition government, cannot be implemented or cannot be fully implemented. We had calculated a growth impulse of around 0.5% but this has now failed to materialize."
4. Cameras
5. SOUNDBITE (German) Robert Habeck, German Economy Minister:
"Secondly, the early election means that domestic political uncertainty is still rising or is high."
6. Economy Ministry sign
7. SOUNDBITE (German) Robert Habeck, German Economy Minister:
"And the third is the foreign policy or geopolitical uncertainty on the markets, primarily due to the election of Donald Trump and the announcement of tariffs."
8. Habeck leaving podium
STORYLINE:
Germany’s government on Wednesday slashed its 2025 growth forecast for the country’s economy, Europe’s biggest, to just 0.3% after it shrank for two consecutive years.
The new projection is much lower than the government’s previous forecast of 1.1% growth, issued in October.
Vice Chancellor Robert Habeck, who is also Germany’s economy minister, said his coalition government had struggled to fully implement its economic policies.
Meanwhile, uncertainty about US economic and trade policy in the wake of Donald Trump’s election, and about Germany’s own post-election course have acted as a brake on sentiment for investment and consumers, he told a news conference.
"Overall, Germany is stuck in stagnation," he said.
Germany has managed no meaningful economic growth in the past four years as it has struggled to deal with major shifts in the global economy and with structural challenges of its own.
Preliminary figures released two weeks ago showed that gross domestic product contracted by 0.2% last year, following a 0.3% decline in 2023.
The economy is one of the top issues in the campaign for an early German parliamentary election on Feb. 23.
It is being held seven months before it was originally scheduled after Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s three-party coalition collapsed in November in a dispute about how to revitalize the economy.
Contenders to lead the next government have made contrasting proposals on how to get it growing again.
AP video shot by Fanny Brodersen. Production by Kerstin Sopke
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