The great German sausage crisis

Available for over a year

In Germany in 2002 there were some 19,000 small, neighbourhood butcher shops. They made and sold, among other things, that “great emblem" of Germany’s national diet – sausages. At last count, in 2021, there were fewer than 11,000 shops left. The German butchers' trade association says there are “massive problems” finding trained staff and young people who want to learn from the bottom up. In Lörrach, 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’ shop – and the threat to the sausage – 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. The chamber of trade will likely be going back to India later this year to recruit for other industries. Producer/presenter: Tim Mansel (Photo by Tim Mansel)