Today,
we are in Germany, in Berlin to be more specific.
To
start, Berlin is the capital of Germany, so you can imagine lots of economic
activities are situated here.
The
Berlin economy has been affected several times by the city’s changing political
fortunes. In contrary to what some of you may think, Berlin still has one of
the lowest per capita income of all metropolitan regions in Germany and one of
the largest state debts.
Berlin
is one of the most well-known cities in Germany, so I find it logical that the
tourist industry is experiencing a growth. These growth rates are even higher
than any of the other business sectors
in Berlin. The number of overnight stays sets a new record each year.
Another
fact about Berlin is that it is Germany’s start- up capital. With this I mean
that it is the city where the most companies are started.
So now
I’m talking about companies, I’ll tell you something more about “famous”
companies situated in Berlin. I’m not going to bore you with lots of details
concerning employment, I just want to say that Siemens has its headquarters in
Berlin.
But, did
you know that among the 20 largest employers in Berlin is Daimler, Bayer Health
Care, BMW motorcycles and Air Berlin? When I read this information in my
brochure, I didn’t really believe it. Those are all companies I know by name
and I didn’t even expect they were situated in Berlin, except Air Berlin of
course.
So now,
I’m coming back to something more interesting, tourism. Berlin has 781 hotels, with
over 125 thousand beds (June 2012). Just to give you a better view on the
number of tourists, I’ll give you some facts:
·
20.8
million overnight hotel stays in 2010· 9.1 million hotel guests in 2010
· 135 million day visitors a year
The
large number of visitors puts Berlin on the third place among the most- visited
cities in the European Union.
Berlin
is also in the top three convention cities in the world, which contributes to
the large number of visitors. Several large-scale fairs are held annually in
the city, which attracts a significant number of business visitors.
As last
point I would like to tell you something more about the creative industries in
Berlin. These sectors consist of music, design, fashion, publishing, video
games,… The creative industries have contributed about 20% of Berlin’s gross
domestic product in 2005.
I have
to say, I knew Germany was an important economic country, but I didn’t expect
Berlin an important city. This was my second time I was in Berlin and I have to
admit, I didn’t really pay attention to the economical aspect of the city.
Now that
we have visited several companies, I think there could be very positive
business relationships between these companies and our company, fingers
crossed!
Sources:
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