Joint memorandum for a strong chemical SME sector 

In a joint mem­o­ran­dum, the chem­i­cal union IGBCE and the Ger­man Chem­i­cal Indus­try Asso­ci­a­tion (VCI) appeal to the future Ger­man gov­ern­ment to improve the frame­work con­di­tions for medi­um-sized com­pa­nies in the sector.

“Medi­um-sized com­pa­nies in the chem­i­cal-phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal indus­try can hard­ly sur­vive in inter­na­tion­al com­pe­ti­tion any­more due to the dete­ri­o­ra­tion of the frame­work con­di­tions. There is an urgent need for a rethink here and for politi­cians to take con­sis­tent countermeasures.”

- Hen­rik Foll­mann, Chair­man of the Com­mit­tee of Inde­pen­dent Entrepreneurs

Good approach­es in the coali­tion agree­ment of the future Ger­man gov­ern­ment must now be trans­lat­ed into con­crete polit­i­cal action. 

With a view to the plans of the “traf­fic light” in ener­gy pol­i­cy, the orga­ni­za­tions wel­come the fact that the EEG levy, which is a par­tic­u­lar bur­den on SMEs, is to be financed from the fed­er­al bud­get in future. Around 1.2 bil­lion euros of the levy per year has so far been shoul­dered main­ly by small and medi­um-sized chem­i­cal com­pa­nies, for which there are hard­ly any exemp­tions. “Ger­many’s ener­gy prices are a bur­den both for the indus­tri­al loca­tion and for social peace,” says Michael Vas­sil­iadis, chair­man of the IGBCE. “We need a rad­i­cal ener­gy turn­around, also in terms of the tax bur­den. The trans­for­ma­tion will not suc­ceed with­out a mul­ti­ple of cli­mate-neu­tral elec­tric­i­ty — and that afford­able for every cit­i­zen and every business.” 

SMEs also view the EU Com­mis­sion’s plans for a “Chem­i­cals Strat­e­gy for Sus­tain­abil­i­ty” with con­sid­er­able con­cern. Numer­ous reg­u­la­tions on clas­si­fi­ca­tion, label­ing and envi­ron­men­tal pro­tec­tion are to be changed. Brus­sels is also plan­ning blan­ket reg­u­la­tions for groups of sub­stances with cer­tain prop­er­ties. In the future, restric­tions are to be imple­ment­ed in a fast-track pro­ce­dure with­out pri­or risk assess­ment and con­sul­ta­tion with man­u­fac­tur­ers. This would sig­nif­i­cant­ly reduce the num­ber of avail­able chem­i­cals — and thus also the num­ber of medi­um-sized com­pa­nies and jobs. “The new chem­i­cals strat­e­gy must retain the scientific 

risk assess­ment,” demands VCI Pres­i­dent Chris­t­ian Kull­mann. “Ide­o­log­i­cal­ly moti­vat­ed bans on indi­vid­ual sub­stances would not only hit com­pa­nies, but also set back the devel­op­ment of new, sus­tain­able prod­ucts for cli­mate pro­tec­tion. No one in Brus­sels can want that — and not in Berlin either.” 

A major prob­lem for SMEs is the cur­rent lev­el of bureau­cra­cy. Over­ly bureau­crat­ic and there­fore slow approval pro­ce­dures as a result of rigid admin­is­tra­tive struc­tures are par­a­lyz­ing SMEs. IGBCE and VCI there­fore expect the Ger­man gov­ern­ment to halve plan­ning and approval times as a goal. Accord­ing to the IGBCE and VCI, there is con­sid­er­able scope to speed up approval pro­ce­dures by short­en­ing dead­lines and dig­i­tiz­ing process­es in the authorities. 

Job guarantor and reliable factor for prosperity in the regions 

In the chem­i­cal and phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal indus­try in Ger­many, more than 90 per­cent of the com­pa­nies belong to the SME sec­tor. These 1,900 pre­dom­i­nant­ly fam­i­ly-run com­pa­nies gen­er­ate sales of over 61 bil­lion euros with around 175,000 employ­ees. This cor­re­sponds to a good 30 per­cent of the indus­try’s total sales. Often locat­ed away from the major pop­u­la­tion cen­ters, SMEs are a reli­able local force, offer­ing secure, skilled jobs and attrac­tive train­ing oppor­tu­ni­ties for young peo­ple. In no oth­er coun­try in the world do chem­i­cal SMEs play such an impor­tant eco­nom­ic and struc­tur­al role as in Germany.