Dusseldorf The high rate of new infections with the omicron variant of the corona virus, which has persisted for weeks, has affected logistics in Germany far less than feared. “The wave seems to have largely passed us by,” explains Martin Bulheller from the Federal Association of Road Haulage and Logistics (BGL) in Frankfurt.
Surprisingly, the relaxation can also be seen on the freight market. At the end of January, the capacity offered in truck transport was 5.9 percent higher than in December, according to the Transporeon freight exchange. Prices on the spot market fell by 10.6 percent.
“From talks with transport companies, we hear that there have recently been losses of five to six percent of the workforce,” said Stephan Sieber from Transporeon to the Handelsblatt. At the beginning of the wave in mid-December, the freight and storage companies were still prepared for a loss of between ten and 15 percent of the workforce. In January, the transport association BGL even called for a crisis team at the Federal Office for Goods Transport, which should ensure that urgently needed goods are prioritized.
This is currently no longer the case. Despite high incidences in Germany, the big players in logistics are hardly affected by the failures. Kuehne + Nagel, for example, one of the largest freight forwarding groups with 13,000 employees in 150 branches and goods distribution centers across Germany, will provide specific figures on request: According to Hamburg, one to two percent of the workforce is currently absent due to corona diseases.
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Due to the Omikron wave, capacity restrictions are currently only being recorded in their own logistics centers in absolute individual cases, according to the logistics group Fiege in Greven, Münsterland. “In Germany we have about two percent more sick leave across the group than in the same months of previous years,” reports a spokesman.
In the past five years before Corona, the sickness rate in the transport industry was six percent. Across Germany, the statutory health insurance companies reported a rate of 4.34 percent across all sectors in 2021.
Germany’s largest logistics group, Deutsche Post, with its parcel, express and freight subsidiaries operating under the DHL name, has also given the all-clear. “We are currently not observing any effects on our ability to operate,” explains a spokeswoman on request. With 175,000 employees in Germany, Deutsche Post is the third largest employer in the country after Volkswagen and Deutsche Bahn.
The online sender Amazon, which has conquered around a quarter of the parcel market with 19,000 permanent logistics employees in Germany, is also relaxed in view of the Omikron wave. “We have no downtime,” reports a spokesman in Munich.
This obviously also applies to international care. Last week, Germany’s largest shipping company Hapag-Lloyd recorded just a single-digit number of domestic employees who had been infected with Corona. Around 1,800 employees work at the headquarters on Hamburg’s Binnenalster and in the local goods distribution centers.
Hygiene measures prevented worse
At best, sea transport could be delayed in some places due to Corona, a spokesman pointed out. “Sometimes the crew can’t continue the voyage for a week or 10 days until everyone tests negative,” he said. However, this rarely happens due to the strict contact restrictions for the crews. In Germany, the omicron wave is currently not very noticeable.
Germany’s logisticians owe the comparatively low number of failures to comprehensive hygiene and protective measures. In order to ensure the safety of employees and customers, while at the same time ensuring operation and service, Deutsche Post developed emergency and pandemic plans at an early stage – monitored by a task force, regularly coordinated with the WHO and the Robert Koch Institute.
In its warehouses, Kuehne + Nagel ensured at an early stage that shift groups were strictly separated from one another and that they did not meet at the handover. Warehouse workers wear a beeper that sends a warning signal as soon as employees come closer than 1.50 meters.
Amazon is also taking the measures seriously: “Since the beginning of the pandemic, Amazon has spent more than $15 billion worldwide to ensure the safety of employees and to continue to be there for customers,” explains a spokesman for the US group.
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There are also strict regulations for business partners in many places. Everyone who enters the headquarters of the Fiege logistics group is first handed a corona test kit at reception. Only those who walk out of the toilet room with a negative result are allowed to continue their visit.
A lightning survey by the German Chamber of Industry and Commerce (DIHK) initially led to greater concern almost two weeks ago. Among the 370 companies surveyed from five sectors, complaints about staff shortages were noted, particularly in logistics. The failures in their own company are “considerable”, answered 36 percent of those surveyed, eight percent even described them as “critical”. The flash survey did not name specific failure rates.
Experts such as Transporeon boss Stephan Sieber point out that the majority of these bottlenecks are at best indirectly attributable to Corona. “Many drivers have left the industry because of the pandemic to switch to supposedly safer jobs,” he observes. This has exacerbated the already existing driver shortage. In addition, transport companies have reduced their truck fleets in view of the crisis in order to reduce the business risk.
The transport association BGL cites the high vaccination rate among drivers as one of the main reasons why the logistics industry got off lightly in the Omicron wave. “As early as last December 2021, the proportion of those who were vaccinated twice was 78 percent,” reports a spokesman. In addition, most of the remaining 22 percent had been vaccinated at least once or, as was probably the case for drivers from Eastern Europe, with the Russian vaccine “Sputnik”.
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