In line with this, the annual average rate of growth in Germany, at a good 1½%, has been lagging ¾ percentage point behind. Comparing Germany with the euro area as a whole excluding Germany, the German shortfall in growth increases to just over 1 percentage point. In 2001, taken on its own, the figure was as much as 1½ percentage points.
Now, there are some commentators here and there who ascribe this performance to increasing globalisation. However, this argument does not hold up under closer examination. Following a period of export weakness in the early 1990s, the German economy achieved extremely good results in foreign trade between 1994 and 2001.