The great German sausage crisis
In Germany in 2002 there were some 19,000 small, neighbourhood butchers\u2019 shops. They made and sold, among other things, that \u201cgreat emblem of Germany\u2019s national diet\u201d \u2013 sausages. At last count, in 2021, there were fewer than 11,000 shops left. The German butchers\u2019 trade association says there are \u201cmassive problems\u201d finding trained staff and young people who want to learn from the bottom up. In L\xf6rrach, in the south-west of Germany, the Chamber of Handcraft, is now looking overseas in order to preserve local culinary traditions. A group of apprentices from India has just started a three-year training programme at the local college and various shops in the vicinity. The decline of the butchers\u2019 shop \u2013 and the threat to the sausage \u2013 mirrors a problem in many branches across the whole of Germany; in social care, in bakeries, in the building trade: people at the top of an ageing population are leaving the workforce at a higher rate than those entering at the bottom. \u201cThe lack of skilled workers is becoming ever more palpable,\u201d says the chamber of trade. They\u2019ll be going back to India later this year to recruit for other industries.
Producer/presenter: Tim Mansel