The 398,200 business service providers employed about 3.3mn persons in Germany in 2000 and achieved a turnover of EUR 327 bn. And as reported by the Federal Statistical Office, the 505,500 enterprises and institutions providing business services employed about 3.7 million persons in 2001 and achieved an annual turnover of about EUR 387.4 billion.

IT
The liberalization of the telecoms markets and the accompanying acceleration in the speed of technological advance has, in the space of but a few years, considerably strengthened Germany's position with regard to competition from other industrialized nations. The contribution made to overall value added by the IT industry, and by telecommunications in particular, is growing at an above-average rate in comparison with other sectors. At the same time, this has resulted in an even more stateof- the-art infrastructure, significant price reductions, new services and thus greatly improved working and living conditions. This provides the requirements necessary for the country to make increased use of its economic advantages in the framework of globalization.