Germany Case

COUNTRY BACKGROUND:

Germany is located in the heart of Western Europe. Its neighboring countries are Demark, Poland, Czech Republic, Austria, Switzerland, France, Luxembourg, Belgium, and Netherlands, and is bordering the North Sea and the Baltic Sea. The area is 357,114 square kilometers, which is about the size of Montana and has a population of 81,305,856 by July 2012, which is ranked number 16 in the world population. Based on representative democracy, Germany is a federal parliamentary republic. The Chief of State is President Joachim Gauck and the head of government or Prime Minister is Chancellor Angela Merkel. Like many countries, Germany has two major parties that share the power: The Christian Democratic Union and the Social Democratic Party. In May 23rd, 1949, Basic Law became constitution of the united Germany. Economically, it is the largest national economy in Europe, the fourth largest by nomial GDP in the world, the fifth by GDP and the world’s largest exporter with $1.408 trillion exported in 2011. Germany is heavily export-oriented. It’s a leading exporter of machinery, vehicles, chemicals, and household equipment.

Using the World Bank Atlas method, the gross national income (GNI) per capita (US dollar) in Germany was 43,170 as of 2011 and is ranked 16th , according to a World Bank report published in 2012. GNI per capita base on purchasing power parity, PPP. Germany’s natural resources are: cola, lignite, natural gas, iron ore, copper, nickel, uranium, salt, construction materials, and arable land. As of 1993, Germany was the world’s largest producer of brown coal, mining nearly twice as much as the next greatest producer, Russia. About 71% of exports of goods “made in Germany” were shipped to European countries. 59% of all goods were delivered to the member states of the European Union. The second important sales market for German goods in 2011 was Asian with a share of about 16%, followed by America, with a share of around 10%. In 2011, Germany mainly exports to France, followed by the United States and the Netherlands, which is worth of 101.5 billion euro to France, 73.7 billion euro to the US and 69.3 billion euro to the Netherlands. In 2011, Germany exported goods worth 1060 billion euro and imported goods worth 902 billion euro. Germany’s primary exports are engines such as high quality cars and railway vehicles. They also export machinery, chemicals, pharmaceutical products, metals, electronics or wine. Some of the countries that they export to are U.S.A, Holland, France, Poland, Switzerland, UK, Italy and Austria. On the other hand, Germany primary imports machinery, vehicles, chemicals, foodstuffs, textiles and metals to Netherlands, China, France, US, Italy, UK, Belgium, Switzerland, and Austria. The currency of Germany is known as Deutsch Mark (DM), which means German Money. It is one of the strongest currencies in the whole world.