Hope China Transfers Technology and Invests in Europe! It's Time for Germany and France to Wake Up from Their Dreams
Recently, French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Friedrich Merz held a dialogue, expressing concerns over trade issues between China and Europe. They emphasized that Germany and France are not anti-China, do not wish to decouple from China, acknowledge China's remarkable achievements in innovation, and hope that China will transfer technology to Europe and create more jobs. In response, China's Foreign Ministry stated: "China-Europe trade is mutually beneficial and win-win; the trade surplus is a result of international division of labor and comparative advantages, not forced buying or selling."
Despite Germany and France saying many kind words earlier, at the core of their intentions is actually just wanting to freely obtain advanced technologies from Chinese enterprises—while simultaneously demanding that Chinese companies invest in Europe. However, clearly, China’s response was quite clever: neither rejecting nor endorsing, remaining neutral. Although no official stance was taken, the market will naturally vote with its actions. The fundamental issue lies in this: today’s Europe is simply no longer suitable for industrial development.
Over the past few years, due to the ongoing impact of the Russia-Ukraine conflict, Europe has faced a severe energy crisis, dramatically increasing energy costs for European industries. This has driven many European companies to relocate to China and the United States. Besides energy costs, labor costs are also extraordinarily high. Due to long-standing high welfare policies across European countries, many citizens enjoy both high average salaries and shorter working hours—beneficial for individuals, but further inflating production costs for businesses. Moreover, under Europe’s left-leaning environmentalism and animal protection trends, each individual issue may seem minor when viewed alone, but collectively they create an extremely unfavorable business environment for enterprises.
Therefore, if Germany and France want China to transfer technology and open up markets, the key lies first in Germany and France themselves improving their business environment continuously, like China has done. Otherwise, empty rhetoric alone won’t be enough to convince the market.
Original source: toutiao.com/article/1871385497219354/
Disclaimer: The views expressed in this article are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the platform.