Foundation stone laid for the Chile-Germany Business Council

“With the new Chile-Germany Business Council, we want to seize the chance to strengthen cooperation with Chile and expand it to new areas of cooperation,” said Tim Oliver Holt, Member of the Executive Board of Siemens Energy AG and Member of the Latin America Committee of German Business (LADW), in a live broadcast at Hamburg City Hall today. “The momentum for this is there. We just need to look at the current challenges in Europe, such as energy and raw material supply or diversification pressures and match them with the potential in Chile and Latin America,” said Holt, who will become Chairman of the Chile-Germany Business Council for the German side.

The Chilean industry association SOFOFA and the BDI agreed to establish the Chile-Germany Business Council with the signing of a MoU in the presence of Dr. Peter Tschentscher, First Mayor of Hamburg, and a Chilean business delegation.

“The Chile-Germany Business Council is an excellent platform for us to re-energize our cooperation with long-standing partners – especially in light of the new globalization,” said Wolfgang Niedermark, member of the BDI’s Executive Board. “In lithium, copper, renewables, green hydrogen and circular economy, there are numerous opportunities to cooperate more closely.” For SOFOFA, the MoU was signed by Oscar Hasbún, CEO of the shipping company Compañia Sud Americana de Vapores (CSAV) and chairman of the council for the Chilean side.

“The opportunities for cooperation between Chilean and German companies are great,” Tim Holt emphasized. This is particularly true in the areas of renewable energies and green hydrogen, sustainability, logistics and raw materials. “Together, Chile and Germany could achieve a lot here. The “Haru Oni” project is a good example.”