According to a report on the Deutsche Welle website: According to a preliminary estimate by the German Machinery and Equipment Manufacturing Association (VDMA), China will surpass Germany for the first time in 2020 and become the global champion of machinery and equipment exports.
According to the VDMA report data, the total global machinery trade in 2020 is about 1.05 trillion euros. Due to the epidemic, this total sales volume has decreased by nearly 10% compared with a year ago. Among them, China's machinery and equipment exports are about 165 billion euros, corresponding to about 15.8% of the global market share. Germany's machinery and equipment exports are about 162 billion euros, corresponding to a market share of 15.5%.
The report pointed out that this means that in the field of machinery and equipment manufacturing, China's exports are ahead of Germany for the first time. In contrast, in 2019, German exports are still ahead of China by about 1.4 percentage points.
In addition, the VDMA report also shows that compared with China, the share of other major machinery exporting countries in the global machinery trade is on a downward trend, but the ranking has not changed. For example, the United States continues to rank third with a market share of 9.1%, followed by Japan with less than 8.6%, and Italy with a market share of approximately 6.7%.
Regarding China becoming the "new export champion", Ulrich Ackermann, head of foreign trade at VDMA, said that this is not surprising. "China has been the world's largest machinery manufacturer for many years," Ackerman said. In fact, China's total sales of 924 billion euros in machinery and equipment last year was almost equal to the sum of the United States, Germany, Japan and Italy. "Therefore, It is only a matter of time before China becomes the leader in foreign machinery trade."
The VDMA study also analyzed the reasons for this change. Ackerman said that “the epidemic has injected a strong impetus into the rise of China’s machinery exports” because although China was affected by the epidemic very early, the duration of the epidemic was short and the time affected was also very short. In comparison, The European sales market suffered severe setbacks due to the epidemic. However, Ackerman also believes that the recovery of the EU economy should be able to ensure that Germany's machinery exports will increase this year and make it "return to the top."
In addition, VDMA also pointed out that the export of Chinese machinery products no longer only flows to emerging market countries in Africa and Asia. Even in Germany, China is now its largest foreign supplier. Moreover, China has made significant progress in many areas and has become a "strong competitor" of Germany. In addition, Ackerman also stated that China has "discovered the importance of standardization" and is becoming the maker of international standardization.
However, on the other hand, the VDMA research also believes that China still lags behind international competitors such as Germany in some areas. "Intelligent production, that is, Industry 4.0, is still a big advantage for Europe, especially German machinery manufacturers," Ackerman said, so Germany still has good export opportunities in the future.
At the same time, Ackerman also emphasized, “Nevertheless, we must improve our competitiveness if we want to meet the challenges of manufacturing in China.”
