Meat dishes are an integral part of German traditional cuisine
Summer, the height of barbecue season in Germany. Retail chains are, of course, well aware of this, and so there is more meat on the shelves than ever, in all forms. Sliced, processed into sausages and cold cuts, packaged, marinated, and skewered: real mountains of meat are piled up in freezers. Moreover, as Deutsche Welle notes, prices are surprisingly low by European standards.
Discounter Aldi this week offers half a kilo of entrecote, as the ad says, "the best steak for connoisseurs" – for seven euros. Even cheaper are pork sausages for grilling: just 3.73 euros per kilogram, says the price tag on the refrigerated display at Aldi. A kilo of minced pork and beef can also be bought for less than four euros. An exception? A promotion or seasonal discount?
No. In Germany, meat is one of the products sold cheaply in all supermarkets. But not because meat, like bread, fruits and vegetables, is considered a staple food and is subject to a reduced VAT rate of 7% instead of 19%.
Billion-dollar turnover in the meat industry
The main reason for this cheapness is that in Germany – compared to other EU countries – producing meat is still not too costly, and meat products are supplied to the market in huge volumes. This industry is one of the most important sectors of the German economy. In 2018, the turnover of the 25 largest German meat producers was about 27 billion euros.
Even though more and more meat and dairy products produced in Germany are sold abroad, there is still an oversupply on the German market. But business is business, and to make a profit, savings have to be made. For example, earnings of workers on livestock farms and slaughterhouses are significantly lower than the average in other sectors of the German economy.
In huge barns, each animal is allocated minimal space. Often there are simply no opportunities for exercise – or any movement at all. This is done deliberately – so that the animal reaches a certain weight as quickly as possible, after which it will be immediately sent to slaughter.
Animal protection lax
Actually, the animal protection law also applies to German farms. However, videos and photos taken with hidden cameras, which animal rights activists publish, show that animals are often kept in terrible conditions. In Germany, the attitude towards accepted standards is more careless than in other EU states, believes Martin Hofstetter from the environmental organization Greenpeace.
Farmers in other EU countries are obliged, for example, to give pigs more space in their stalls. In addition, requirements for cleaning barns of manure slurry are much stricter there, and the use of medications and antibiotics is more tightly controlled. "This development was desired at the political level to make Germany the world champion in exporting cheap meat products," says Hofstetter.
80 kilograms of meat per capita per year
There were times when eating meat in Germany was considered a sign of prosperity. The traditional "Sunday roast" was perceived as something particularly positive. From 1961 to 2011, average per capita meat consumption in the country increased from 64 to 90 kg per year.
However, it then began to decline and currently stands at about 60 kg per year. In addition, according to statistics, each German also accounts for about 20 kg of meat annually that is processed, among other things, into animal feed. According to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), the global average per person consumes about half as much – about 40 kg of meat per year.
According to the Federal Statistical Office, in the first half of 2019, 29.4 million pigs, cattle, sheep, and goats were slaughtered in Germany and processed into 3.9 million tons of meat. This is still one of the highest rates compared to other countries in the world. Currently, Germany produces much more meat than Germans themselves consume.
Most residents of Germany try not to notice publications with shocking photos of mistreated animals. In the supermarket, as a rule, buyers still prefer cheap meat over organic products, whose producers usually show more concern for animals. However, the price of organic products is on average four times higher.
But would the situation improve if meat became more expensive? Politicians in agricultural departments, as well as environmental and animal rights activists, propose raising the VAT rate on meat and animal products from 7% to 19%. And the additional funds that would appear in the budget due to the tax increase would be allocated to improving animal housing conditions. For example, for the reconstruction and re-equipment of livestock and poultry housing facilities.
But this idea has sparked a wave of criticism. Its opponents say that the tax increase would be socially unfair. After all, prices would become higher for all citizens, regardless of their income level. Indeed, after the VAT increase to 19%, the aforementioned entrecote would cost not 7 euros, but 7.78. And a kilogram of sausage would be 4.15 euros instead of 3.73.
Moreover, if various meat semi-finished products, milk, and eggs also become more expensive, a few extra cents in each case add up to several euros at the end of the month. And this, opponents of the tax increase believe, could undermine the budgets of low-income families.
Expensive cheap German meat
But what about those who earn enough? Would they reduce their meat consumption if it became more expensive and they had to spend a few euros more per month on its purchase? Many politicians doubt this.
EU Budget Commissioner Günther Oettinger also warns against such measures within individual EU countries and points out that meat is one of the main food products across the European market. According to the politician, even if the tax on meat in Germany is increased, it will remain cheap in neighboring countries.
Renate Künast, a well-known politician from the Alliance 90/The Greens party, would prefer to start by reducing tax breaks for meat producers. “We subsidize mass industrial livestock farming, allocating hard-earned budget funds for this,” Künast told the Rheinische Post. But in reality, supposedly “cheap” meat costs us much more, because the consequences of modern industrial livestock farming must be taken into account, the politician emphasizes.
These include, for example, costs associated with the climate burden due to large-scale carbon dioxide emissions. These are costs from the excessive use of antibiotics in pork production or the rising cost of groundwater due to nitrate pollution. “That would then be a fair comparison with the cost of organic meat,” Künast concluded.