“The chemical industry in Europe will survive. I’m not worried about that.” – with this optimism, Christian Kohlpaintner met with plenty of approval at the Annual Chemistry Conference, organised by German newspaper Handelsblatt in Frankfurt. “Europe is and will remain the home of speciality chemicals,” added the CEO of the world’s largest chemical distributor, Brenntag. Previously, the long-time Clariant and Celanese manager had seriously criticised his industry – because of its patchwork structure, chemical distribution was “hopelessly inefficient”, he had said, and called for an urgent consolidation of the industry.

He compared his company to youngsters in a football team: “We are a very commercially oriented organisation. As soon as we spot business potential somewhere, we all run there straight away just like the boys on a football pitch chase after the ball. In contrast, we are not so focused on our long-term targets.”

In the long term – the majority of those at the annual meeting were in agreement – the aim of the chemical industry must be to restore and secure its competitiveness over the competition from the Middle East, Asia, and the US. How this could succeed was outlined by Stephan Kothrade, CTO on the group management board of chemical giant BASF: “We must translate the green transformation into a business model.” 

Johannes Heckmann, CEO of speciality chemicals manufacturer Nabaltec, also called for something similar. He said, alongside the politically forced Green Deal, there should also be a corresponding Industrial Deal in order to create fair competitive conditions, for example like the US (with its billion-dollar regional economic development programme, the Inflation Reduction Act) or the state-subsidised national economies of China or Arabia. 

Related: German chemical industry sees a drastic slump in sales, production in 2023

The same line was picked up by Markus Steilemann, CEO of Covestro and honorary president of the German chemical industry association, the VCI. Although he can see “delicate seedlings of an economic recovery”, what is really needed is a booster for more competitiveness, because the energy crisis was – contrary to the assertion by German economy minister Robert Habeck – nowhere near an end.

In fact, electricity had rather become a “luxury product” in Germany that many companies could no longer afford. “The green transformation must be backed by a business case – and it must pay off,” said Steilemann, noting that there were “information and perception deficits in politics” in Berlin and Brussels.

Christian Hartel, CEO of speciality chemicals producer Wacker, seemed rather aggressive in his approach. “I am personally annoyed when we put Germany as a business location at risk by constantly, as an economic nation, throwing a spanner into our own works,” he said emphatically and followed this up by saying: “I want to fight for our country.”

He vehemently rejected reproaches that the industry was constantly calling on the politicians for financial assistance: “We are not subsidy hunters. What we need from politics are reasonable framework conditions. Everything else we can do ourselves – we are, after all, entrepreneurs.”