German economy minister’s China trip features low-key business delegation amid EV clash

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BERLIN/FRANKFURT (Reuters) -German renewables firm Enpal and metal processing group Schoder will be among the companies joining Economy Minister Robert Habeck’s trip to China later this week, suggesting a low-profile delegation as Brussels and Beijing clash over EV tariffs.

Unlike Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s trip to China in April, no German carmaker will accompany Habeck on the four-day trip to South Korea and China, where growing trade tensions between Europe’s top economy and its second-biggest trading partner will take centre stage.

Both Enpal and Schoder said company representatives would participate in the trip, confirming a Handelsblatt report.

Henning Rath, in charge of Enpal’s China business and a member of the delegation, said the company wants to use the trip to strengthen industrial production in the European Union.

“Examples of such lighthouse projects could be an EU-based photovoltaic module production line as well as photovoltaic inverters and batteries,” he said.

“China has achieved technological leadership through joint ventures – this is also the secret recipe to revitalise manufacturing in Europe.”

Automotive supplier Voss is also among the companies travelling with Habeck, as is laboratory gear maker Sartorius, according to people familiar with the matter, making it the only German blue chip joining the delegation.

Sartorius confirmed that its CEO Joachim Kreuzburg would take part in the trip, adding with regard to China the group mostly cared about unfair competition in the area of life science and biopharma.

“On the one hand, this concerns the Chinese side, which promotes preferential treatment of Chinese suppliers when equipping laboratories and production facilities,” it said.

But it was also about German suppliers being disadvantaged in Germany not only vis-à-vis Chinese, but also compared with other international rivals.

Voss did not respond to a request for comment.

Habeck’s trip comes a week after the European Commission proposed tariffs on electric vehicle imports from China, marking a new low point in economic relations and raising fears of economic retaliation.

Potential counter-tariffs would be particularly painful for Germany’s carmakers – Volkswagen, Porsche, Mercedes-Benz and BMW – which heavily rely on China, the world’s biggest auto market.

Mercedes-Benz, BMW, BASF, Bayer and Merck were among the large cap firms that travelled with Scholz during his trip to Beijing earlier this year.

(Reporting by Rene Wagner, Christoph Steitz, Maria Martinez and Patricia WeissEditing by Miranda Murray, Kim Coghill and Sharon Singleton)