Europe must find answer to China's economic strategy – former env min

Germany and Europe lack an answer to China's economic strategy Made in China 2025 that affects crucial areas for the energy transition, former German environment minister and Green member of parliament Jürgen Trittin told tageszeitung (taz) in an interview. As part of the strategy, China for instance pushed to monopolise e-car battery cell production, ousting competition from Europe. “Don’t be fooled: This is about industrial and geostrategic dominance, no different from [US President] Donald Trump’s America First strategy,” Trittin said. He added that the “fact that Regine Günther, the Green transport and environment senator of the city of Berlin, has to fly to Shenzhen to buy electric buses is embarrassing for Germany."
China is extending its economic reach around the globe with "China 2025" and its Belt and Road Initiative development strategy. In 2018, Chinese battery manufacturer CATL decided to build a large factory in the eastern German state of Thuringia to supply manufacturers in the country that invented the automobile with battery cells for low-emission mobility.