In not a single category of the Digital Economy and Society Index does the Federal Republic come close to the top zone. In some cases, Germany is even below average.
The German Digital Industry Association (BVDW) warns of the long-term consequences of this development.
"Our country is sleeping through the digital transformation"
complains Matthias Wahl, President of the BVDW.
"Digitalization is the key issue for the future. It will determine economic performance and where jobs are created in Europe.
For the annual index compilation, the EU Commission examines the state of digitization in five dimensions: Availability and use of fast access, general level of knowledge, Internet usage behavior of the population, digitization of companies and dissemination of e-government offerings.
The five individual results are used to calculate an overall score that makes the digital development status of the EU countries comparable.
With a value of 0.56, Germany is only slightly above the EU average (0.52) and has even come closer to it compared with the previous year.
"We are on a par with Malta and Lithuania, Austria has already left us behind"
warns Wahl.
"Europe's largest economy cannot afford to disappear somewhere in the middle of the pack when it comes to this important issue. In the medium term, we will not be able to avoid bundling all digital competencies in a central ministry. We need to concentrate the design competence in one place."
The European frontrunner is Denmark with a score of 0.71.
"This is our yardstick, not the average".
said Wahl. The slight improvement compared with the previous year should not obscure the growing problems, he added.
"The EU Commission explicitly names Germany as one of the countries with the least progress. That can't be right - we have a responsibility to keep our country competitive in the long term.
It's time to finally address the investments in infrastructure and education needed to make this happen!"
Missing competences
Even though the EU as a whole has seen an increase in the number of graduates in technical and scientific (STEM) subjects (19 graduates per 1,000 young people in their twenties and thirties) and an increase in the proportion of ICT professionals in the workforce (3.5 percent in 2015 compared to 3.2 percent in 2012), nearly half of all Europeans (44 percent) still lack basic digital skills.
