"A state carve-up is the wrong way to go"
In future, the German states are to be responsible for trade fair law. The organisers are opposed to the move.
The marathon of committee hearings leading up to a reform of federal and state responsibilities has come to an end. The reform will not only deal with education policy, environment law and the prison system, the federalism reform will also place German trade fair law on a new footing: The Federal Government wants to transfer its responsibilities to the states. The trade fair organisers oppose the move. "A federal carve-up of the trade fair industry is the wrong way to go for an international location such as Germany", warns Düsseldorf's trade fair boss Werner M. Dornscheidt. Nobody will be able to explain to the growing number of foreign exhibitors, or German companies for that matter, why the rules in Munich are different from those in Hanover, Frankfurt or Düsseldorf. Michael von Zitzewitz, head of Messe Frankfurt, sees the location jeopardised by the transfer of trade fair law to the states. The Association of the German Trade Fair Industry (AUMA), Berlin, addressed the experts in the hearings and pointed out that a federal break-up of trade fair law does not have the support of the trade fair industry. The AUMA is especially fearful of the imaginative powers of the states which, unlike the federal government, are the owners of many trade fair venues. Harald Kötter, AUMA spokesman: "The reform could arouse appetites."
m+a report Nr.4 / 2006 vom 15.06.2006
m+a report vom 15. Juni 2006