The business community in Germany and China has long been worrying about the German Supply Chain Act – particularly because it is so incredibly difficult to comply with the regulations in the People’s Republic. Without independent audits, it is almost impossible to reliably prove whether there is forced labor somewhere in the supply chain after all. A survey by the Hamburger Stiftung für Wirtschaftsethik available to Table.Media, shows that this does not necessarily equal a general rejection of regulating supply chains.
SMEs consider the protection of human rights in the supply chain to be absolutely necessary, as Caspar Dohmen analyzes. However, companies are less pleased with how the German law is being implemented. Not all of them feel properly represented by their associations either.
China is currently expanding its presence in an inhospitable spot on Earth. The People’s Republic is currently building its fifth and largest research station to date in Antarctica. Science is one thing. But China’s forays into Antarctica are also part of a “quest for superpower status“, writes Joern Petring. The US think tank CSIS has analyzed satellite images and a US military report. They suggest that Beijing’s stations in the Arctic could also be secret observation posts: Several of them have been fitted with conspicuous antennas, for example.
If a hole were drilled from Beijing to the other side of the planet, one would end up in the South Atlantic, between Argentina and Antarctica. So hardly any other place could be further away from China’s center of power than the Antarctic region.
Despite the enormous distance, China is harboring grand ambitions on the icy continent. A recent report by the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) shows how active they are in the region. After analyzing recent satellite images, the US think tank discovered that the construction of the new Taishang station on the Ross Sea, in particular, is progressing rapidly. It is China’s fifth research station on the South Pole.
“China is currently undertaking the most significant expansion of its footprint there in a decade,” the authors write. With an area of about 5,000 square meters, the new station is significantly larger than all previous bases of the People’s Republic. They argue that the growing presence of the People’s Republic in the remote polar regions also serves to “advance military and strategic goals.” China’s advances in Antarctica and the Arctic are part of its “broader pursuit of global great power status.”
According to international law, China, like many other nations, is allowed to maintain a presence in Antarctica. The legal basis for this is the Antarctic Treaty of 1959. This global agreement regulates political and economic activities on the continent and was initially signed by twelve nations, including the United States and the Soviet Union at the time. Today, more than 50 states joined; around 30 of them operate research stations.
The treaty stipulates that Antarctica may only be used for peaceful purposes. Military activities are prohibited. Nor may anyone lay claims over the Antarctic continent. Since then, the territorial claims of several states such as the United Kingdom, France, Argentina or Australia based on earlier acquisitions have been suspended.
Joining the treaty was anything but easy for China. In 1981, the treaty members rejected its first attempt to join – which Beijing perceived as a humiliation at the time. Then, in 1983, China signed the treaty. A short time later, construction of the Great Wall Station began, China’s first foothold in the region. Today, Beijing operates two stations on the coast and two inland.
The US may still maintain a larger research presence in Antarctica than China. But according to CSIS, China is currently more active in Antarctica than any other nation. Beijing is keen to be perceived as a strong Antarctic nation and hopes that its growing scientific presence will pave the way for having a greater say in the future administration of the region.
There are many disputes: For example, whether mineral mining should be allowed in the region or to what extent fishing should be allowed in the Arctic waters. Together with Russia, China has blocked the creation of new conservation areas in the region for years.
According to CSIS, however, China could have more than just showing off its geopolitical weight in Antarctica. The CSIS authors say that the equipment of the Chinese stations could also be used for espionage. They cite a US military report – and warn of “dual-use technologies” that “are likely intended, at least in part, to improve PLA capabilities.”
For instance, CSIS claims that the new Taishang station will be equipped with a satellite ground station that could be used for both scientific communication and espionage. The station’s location, which is currently under construction, is suited to collecting telemetry data from rockets launched from Australia or New Zealand, for example.
Chinese reports also indicate that China plans to expand its Zhongshan station with additional antennas. These antennas are to be built by the China Aerospace Science and Industry Corporation (CASIC). According to CSIS, China could use its position in Antarctica to gather information in the Indian Ocean to monitor Indian naval forces.
A yet unreleased survey by the Hamburger Stiftung für Wirtschaftsethik (Hamburg Foundation for Business Ethics) available to Table.Media offers a rare detailed insight into the perception of the Supply Chain Act by Germany’s small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). The confidentially surveyed companies consider human rights protection in value creation networks to be “necessary” in principle. And they “predominantly believe that a legal framework or binding strategy is necessary,” write the study authors Christiane Hellar, Jesco Kreft and Miriam Putz.
In particular, supply chains in China have recently been in the public eye. German carmakers, in particular, face pressure due to the high risk of forced labor among their suppliers. However, as foreign companies cannot enforce the necessary independent audits against the will of local authorities, much uncertainty persists. Other sectors are also affected: agriculture, solar, and mining.
Because German consumers have become far more aware of the problem, “there is a high acceptance of the German Supply Chain Act” (LkSG) among companies.
For years, two positions from the business community have dominated the public discourse on supply chain regulation in Germany: On the one side, there are clear supporters of supply chain laws. These include companies such as mountain sports equipment producer Vaude and coffee chain retailer Tchibo as well as mostly smaller progressive business associations such as the German Sustainable Business Association or B.A.U.M. And on the other side are large associations that have long opposed national supply chain regulation on human rights and now want to prevent the EU from also adopting regulations that go too far in their eyes. Important voices here are the Federation of German Industries, Confederation of German Employers’ Associations and Mechanical Engineering Industry Association.
Critics refer to competence problems, bureaucracy, costs and practicability. Recently, the German Family Business Foundation warned against “inflationary” regulation. Currently, companies have to implement 20 new laws and directives with auditing, reporting and disclosure requirements. Twelve projects come from Europe, and eight are from Germany. “We cannot master the ecological transformation with reporting obligations and regulation, but above all with entrepreneurial initiative and innovation,” said Professor Rainer Kirchdoerfer, Chairman of the Foundation for Family Businesses and Politics.
The survey by the Hamburger Stiftung für Unternehmensethik conveys a third, different position of companies: SMEs that are irritated by the criticism of supply chain legislation voiced by their own associations – or companies that consider supply chain regulation to be generally right, but are displeased with its implementation.
Many SMEs are already working on the subject, although they are not directly affected by the law, as the obligation so far only applies to companies with more than 3,000 employees. But large companies are passing on the requirements to their customers – primarily SMEs – which, the analysis shows, “leads to a broadening of human rights due diligence obligations far beyond the scope of the law.”
The companies surveyed speak of financial burdens caused by supply chain regulation. However, the report says these cannot be accurately quantified as the implementation of human rights due diligence obligations is predominantly a cross-sectional task.
Companies considered using additional resources to be a “reasonable entrepreneurial investment.” Some companies see a “representation problem” on the part of their associations. “Their political interest groups first ignored the fundamentally positive position of many SMEs, then spent too long trying to prevent it, and finally were not sufficiently pragmatic in their involvement in the concrete design,” it is said. They consider doubts that SMEs cannot operationally and conceptually implement the requirements of the law to be inappropriate. This political narrative was even dismissed by “companies that were originally skeptical of the law as being unrelated to the economy or the SME sector,” according to the study.
However, companies see the danger that “in the medium term, a compliance perspective could dominate the law’s implementation.” Companies could focus on becoming legally untouchable, while the real improvement of conditions along the supply chains would be neglected. As a result, there would be little benefit to the matter at hand – i.e., improving the situation for people and the environment along supply chains.
SMEs expect “considerable enforcement problems” in China, where the requirements from the Supply Chain Act and their means of exerting influence on the ground confront them with “paradoxical obligations,” which could fundamentally question a whole range of business models with a significant link to China in the supply chain. Company representatives say it is impossible to guarantee compliance with human rights “in an authoritarian, non-democratic country.” Upon further inquiry, about a quarter of respondents stated they would consider a complete withdrawal from certain Chinese regions in the medium term.
When implementing human rights due diligence, companies usually used instruments and procedures with which they already have experience in the area of environmental protection.
SMEs are not satisfied with the implementation of the law by the German Office for Economic Affairs and Export Control (BAFA). Until well into the late summer of 2022, the agency did not provide any assistance in interpreting important points. Furthermore, companies wish for more concrete help from the authority’s helpdesk regarding procedures, instruments, reports and assessments of the scope and depth of the law. The companies also express dissatisfaction with the corresponding advisory services offered by German chambers of commerce.
Sinolytics is a European research-based consultancy entirely focused on China. It advises European companies on their strategic orientation and concrete business activities in the People’s Republic.
When Lihong Koblin was young, her father got up every morning before the first sunlight and met his students in the courtyard of the family home. As a traditional Wu Shu master, he had dedicated his life entirely to practicing and teaching the martial art. “His inner attitude and demeanor made a big impression on me at the time,” recalls Koblin, a Taiji master and founder of a Taiji institute in Freiburg, Germany. “Sometimes he was called to Wu Shu competitions, where it was not uncommon for young men to get into violent group fights.”
With a few quick moves, her father separated the fighting parties. He then said a few words and left. “I have his voice in my ear to this day: The art of fighting is to stop the fight.”
Koblin studied in Shandong and Sichuan provinces and came to Berlin in 1999 as an exchange student, where she met her husband. After graduation, she worked in finance around the world, but felt a growing urge to reconnect with her roots. She spent years reflecting on her origins and Chinese culture, eventually traveling repeatedly to the place of Taiji’s origin, the Daoist Wudang Mountains in central China. “I realized that I shouldn’t keep this knowledge and practice, which has been maturing inside me since the early years of my life, to myself,” Koblin says. “That it was even my duty to pass it on to society.”
Koblin moved with her family to Freiburg almost 20 years ago and founded a taiji institute, which she still runs to this day. There, she teaches Taiji and Qigong. “Having long since outgrown my parental home, I am in a sense reviving my childhood,” she says. Seeing the change and healing that Taiji and Qigong bring about in the lives of her students fills her with deep joy.
Koblin’s own return to the art of movement and her family’s tradition helped her find her way in foreign countries and eventually in Germany. “To this day, I am usually the only Chinese or Asian in my professional and personal life,” she says. She says that intercultural communication and the search for cultural identity are ever-present themes for her.
By practicing and passing on traditional Chinese movement forms, Koblin found a way to make cultural differences, but also similarities, visible, to make them tangible, and to empower herself and her students to make their own decisions. Her work is thus always also a process of opening up and self-empowerment.
When asked about her future goals, Koblin is modest: “I don’t have any goals that I necessarily want to strive for,” she says. But she does pursue the ambition that every lesson she gives differs from the one before – “and that I’m inspired every day.” Svenja Napp
Winter wheat harvest in the village of Gujiabang in the eastern Chinese province of Jiangsu: Combine harvesters bring in the ripe grain. According to official figures, the winter wheat harvest is even ahead of schedule this year.
The business community in Germany and China has long been worrying about the German Supply Chain Act – particularly because it is so incredibly difficult to comply with the regulations in the People’s Republic. Without independent audits, it is almost impossible to reliably prove whether there is forced labor somewhere in the supply chain after all. A survey by the Hamburger Stiftung für Wirtschaftsethik available to Table.Media, shows that this does not necessarily equal a general rejection of regulating supply chains.
SMEs consider the protection of human rights in the supply chain to be absolutely necessary, as Caspar Dohmen analyzes. However, companies are less pleased with how the German law is being implemented. Not all of them feel properly represented by their associations either.
China is currently expanding its presence in an inhospitable spot on Earth. The People’s Republic is currently building its fifth and largest research station to date in Antarctica. Science is one thing. But China’s forays into Antarctica are also part of a “quest for superpower status“, writes Joern Petring. The US think tank CSIS has analyzed satellite images and a US military report. They suggest that Beijing’s stations in the Arctic could also be secret observation posts: Several of them have been fitted with conspicuous antennas, for example.
If a hole were drilled from Beijing to the other side of the planet, one would end up in the South Atlantic, between Argentina and Antarctica. So hardly any other place could be further away from China’s center of power than the Antarctic region.
Despite the enormous distance, China is harboring grand ambitions on the icy continent. A recent report by the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) shows how active they are in the region. After analyzing recent satellite images, the US think tank discovered that the construction of the new Taishang station on the Ross Sea, in particular, is progressing rapidly. It is China’s fifth research station on the South Pole.
“China is currently undertaking the most significant expansion of its footprint there in a decade,” the authors write. With an area of about 5,000 square meters, the new station is significantly larger than all previous bases of the People’s Republic. They argue that the growing presence of the People’s Republic in the remote polar regions also serves to “advance military and strategic goals.” China’s advances in Antarctica and the Arctic are part of its “broader pursuit of global great power status.”
According to international law, China, like many other nations, is allowed to maintain a presence in Antarctica. The legal basis for this is the Antarctic Treaty of 1959. This global agreement regulates political and economic activities on the continent and was initially signed by twelve nations, including the United States and the Soviet Union at the time. Today, more than 50 states joined; around 30 of them operate research stations.
The treaty stipulates that Antarctica may only be used for peaceful purposes. Military activities are prohibited. Nor may anyone lay claims over the Antarctic continent. Since then, the territorial claims of several states such as the United Kingdom, France, Argentina or Australia based on earlier acquisitions have been suspended.
Joining the treaty was anything but easy for China. In 1981, the treaty members rejected its first attempt to join – which Beijing perceived as a humiliation at the time. Then, in 1983, China signed the treaty. A short time later, construction of the Great Wall Station began, China’s first foothold in the region. Today, Beijing operates two stations on the coast and two inland.
The US may still maintain a larger research presence in Antarctica than China. But according to CSIS, China is currently more active in Antarctica than any other nation. Beijing is keen to be perceived as a strong Antarctic nation and hopes that its growing scientific presence will pave the way for having a greater say in the future administration of the region.
There are many disputes: For example, whether mineral mining should be allowed in the region or to what extent fishing should be allowed in the Arctic waters. Together with Russia, China has blocked the creation of new conservation areas in the region for years.
According to CSIS, however, China could have more than just showing off its geopolitical weight in Antarctica. The CSIS authors say that the equipment of the Chinese stations could also be used for espionage. They cite a US military report – and warn of “dual-use technologies” that “are likely intended, at least in part, to improve PLA capabilities.”
For instance, CSIS claims that the new Taishang station will be equipped with a satellite ground station that could be used for both scientific communication and espionage. The station’s location, which is currently under construction, is suited to collecting telemetry data from rockets launched from Australia or New Zealand, for example.
Chinese reports also indicate that China plans to expand its Zhongshan station with additional antennas. These antennas are to be built by the China Aerospace Science and Industry Corporation (CASIC). According to CSIS, China could use its position in Antarctica to gather information in the Indian Ocean to monitor Indian naval forces.
A yet unreleased survey by the Hamburger Stiftung für Wirtschaftsethik (Hamburg Foundation for Business Ethics) available to Table.Media offers a rare detailed insight into the perception of the Supply Chain Act by Germany’s small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). The confidentially surveyed companies consider human rights protection in value creation networks to be “necessary” in principle. And they “predominantly believe that a legal framework or binding strategy is necessary,” write the study authors Christiane Hellar, Jesco Kreft and Miriam Putz.
In particular, supply chains in China have recently been in the public eye. German carmakers, in particular, face pressure due to the high risk of forced labor among their suppliers. However, as foreign companies cannot enforce the necessary independent audits against the will of local authorities, much uncertainty persists. Other sectors are also affected: agriculture, solar, and mining.
Because German consumers have become far more aware of the problem, “there is a high acceptance of the German Supply Chain Act” (LkSG) among companies.
For years, two positions from the business community have dominated the public discourse on supply chain regulation in Germany: On the one side, there are clear supporters of supply chain laws. These include companies such as mountain sports equipment producer Vaude and coffee chain retailer Tchibo as well as mostly smaller progressive business associations such as the German Sustainable Business Association or B.A.U.M. And on the other side are large associations that have long opposed national supply chain regulation on human rights and now want to prevent the EU from also adopting regulations that go too far in their eyes. Important voices here are the Federation of German Industries, Confederation of German Employers’ Associations and Mechanical Engineering Industry Association.
Critics refer to competence problems, bureaucracy, costs and practicability. Recently, the German Family Business Foundation warned against “inflationary” regulation. Currently, companies have to implement 20 new laws and directives with auditing, reporting and disclosure requirements. Twelve projects come from Europe, and eight are from Germany. “We cannot master the ecological transformation with reporting obligations and regulation, but above all with entrepreneurial initiative and innovation,” said Professor Rainer Kirchdoerfer, Chairman of the Foundation for Family Businesses and Politics.
The survey by the Hamburger Stiftung für Unternehmensethik conveys a third, different position of companies: SMEs that are irritated by the criticism of supply chain legislation voiced by their own associations – or companies that consider supply chain regulation to be generally right, but are displeased with its implementation.
Many SMEs are already working on the subject, although they are not directly affected by the law, as the obligation so far only applies to companies with more than 3,000 employees. But large companies are passing on the requirements to their customers – primarily SMEs – which, the analysis shows, “leads to a broadening of human rights due diligence obligations far beyond the scope of the law.”
The companies surveyed speak of financial burdens caused by supply chain regulation. However, the report says these cannot be accurately quantified as the implementation of human rights due diligence obligations is predominantly a cross-sectional task.
Companies considered using additional resources to be a “reasonable entrepreneurial investment.” Some companies see a “representation problem” on the part of their associations. “Their political interest groups first ignored the fundamentally positive position of many SMEs, then spent too long trying to prevent it, and finally were not sufficiently pragmatic in their involvement in the concrete design,” it is said. They consider doubts that SMEs cannot operationally and conceptually implement the requirements of the law to be inappropriate. This political narrative was even dismissed by “companies that were originally skeptical of the law as being unrelated to the economy or the SME sector,” according to the study.
However, companies see the danger that “in the medium term, a compliance perspective could dominate the law’s implementation.” Companies could focus on becoming legally untouchable, while the real improvement of conditions along the supply chains would be neglected. As a result, there would be little benefit to the matter at hand – i.e., improving the situation for people and the environment along supply chains.
SMEs expect “considerable enforcement problems” in China, where the requirements from the Supply Chain Act and their means of exerting influence on the ground confront them with “paradoxical obligations,” which could fundamentally question a whole range of business models with a significant link to China in the supply chain. Company representatives say it is impossible to guarantee compliance with human rights “in an authoritarian, non-democratic country.” Upon further inquiry, about a quarter of respondents stated they would consider a complete withdrawal from certain Chinese regions in the medium term.
When implementing human rights due diligence, companies usually used instruments and procedures with which they already have experience in the area of environmental protection.
SMEs are not satisfied with the implementation of the law by the German Office for Economic Affairs and Export Control (BAFA). Until well into the late summer of 2022, the agency did not provide any assistance in interpreting important points. Furthermore, companies wish for more concrete help from the authority’s helpdesk regarding procedures, instruments, reports and assessments of the scope and depth of the law. The companies also express dissatisfaction with the corresponding advisory services offered by German chambers of commerce.
Sinolytics is a European research-based consultancy entirely focused on China. It advises European companies on their strategic orientation and concrete business activities in the People’s Republic.
When Lihong Koblin was young, her father got up every morning before the first sunlight and met his students in the courtyard of the family home. As a traditional Wu Shu master, he had dedicated his life entirely to practicing and teaching the martial art. “His inner attitude and demeanor made a big impression on me at the time,” recalls Koblin, a Taiji master and founder of a Taiji institute in Freiburg, Germany. “Sometimes he was called to Wu Shu competitions, where it was not uncommon for young men to get into violent group fights.”
With a few quick moves, her father separated the fighting parties. He then said a few words and left. “I have his voice in my ear to this day: The art of fighting is to stop the fight.”
Koblin studied in Shandong and Sichuan provinces and came to Berlin in 1999 as an exchange student, where she met her husband. After graduation, she worked in finance around the world, but felt a growing urge to reconnect with her roots. She spent years reflecting on her origins and Chinese culture, eventually traveling repeatedly to the place of Taiji’s origin, the Daoist Wudang Mountains in central China. “I realized that I shouldn’t keep this knowledge and practice, which has been maturing inside me since the early years of my life, to myself,” Koblin says. “That it was even my duty to pass it on to society.”
Koblin moved with her family to Freiburg almost 20 years ago and founded a taiji institute, which she still runs to this day. There, she teaches Taiji and Qigong. “Having long since outgrown my parental home, I am in a sense reviving my childhood,” she says. Seeing the change and healing that Taiji and Qigong bring about in the lives of her students fills her with deep joy.
Koblin’s own return to the art of movement and her family’s tradition helped her find her way in foreign countries and eventually in Germany. “To this day, I am usually the only Chinese or Asian in my professional and personal life,” she says. She says that intercultural communication and the search for cultural identity are ever-present themes for her.
By practicing and passing on traditional Chinese movement forms, Koblin found a way to make cultural differences, but also similarities, visible, to make them tangible, and to empower herself and her students to make their own decisions. Her work is thus always also a process of opening up and self-empowerment.
When asked about her future goals, Koblin is modest: “I don’t have any goals that I necessarily want to strive for,” she says. But she does pursue the ambition that every lesson she gives differs from the one before – “and that I’m inspired every day.” Svenja Napp
Winter wheat harvest in the village of Gujiabang in the eastern Chinese province of Jiangsu: Combine harvesters bring in the ripe grain. According to official figures, the winter wheat harvest is even ahead of schedule this year.
