FDP on the economy

The FDP wants to make it easier to launch companies out of universities and to set up a patent fund. It also wants to improve knowledge and technology transfer and the support of talent.

New companies should grow more easily out of universities. The FDP wants better rules and more work with businesses. There should be a fund for patents. A patent protects an invention.

The plan includes better framework conditions, more cooperation between universities and business, so-called founding zones, and entrepreneurship education. Talent is to be supported through talent scouts and dedicated centers, among other things. The program also speaks of "innovation bridges" for knowledge and technology transfer.

The FDP wants to make Schleswig-Holstein the most small-business-friendly state in Germany, with good training, less red tape, and upgraded infrastructure. Starting a business and spinning off companies from universities are to become easier. It expects the federal government to cut red tape and improve financing for startups.

The FDP wants to strengthen small and mid-sized companies. They should have less paperwork. It should be easier to start a company. Ideas from research should turn into new companies faster.

The program commits to the social market economy with property, fair competition, social partnership, and moderate taxes. To cut red tape, reporting duties are to be reduced, for example by having only one recipient, and tax law is to be simplified. The federal government is also expected to make business takeovers, for instance in the skilled trades, easier to finance. As priorities for the next five years the FDP names energy, health, logistics, tourism, and food, along with pharmaceuticals, chemicals, medical technology, and defense technology including naval shipbuilding. The transfer of knowledge and technology from universities and research institutes such as GEOMAR is to improve considerably.

The FDP wants to continue the state's strategy for attracting businesses and give the state business development agency WT.SH better permanent resources. The aim is to bring in companies, especially from abroad, in a more targeted way.

The FDP wants more companies to come to Schleswig-Holstein. The state agency that helps businesses should get more resources. Companies from other countries are a main target. Small and mid-sized firms should also have good conditions.

The platform calls for pushing ahead with a statewide database of commercial sites and for designating suitable land. The advisory council for small and mid-sized businesses at the economics ministry is to continue. The state's economic clusters are to be reviewed and supported over the long term. Location marketing is to improve, for example through the umbrella brand, trade fair appearances and offices abroad. In the Bundesrat, the FDP wants to make sure laws are friendly to mid-sized businesses, and the liberal professions are to get good conditions as well.

The FDP wants to put the skilled trades at the center of its economic policy and keep the bonus for master craftspeople who start a business. Red tape is to be cut and vocational training strengthened.

The FDP wants to help the skilled trades. Master craftspeople who start a business should keep getting a bonus. There should be less paperwork. Job training should get better.

The platform lists measures against shortages of skilled workers and raw materials and calls for cutting red tape. Vocational training is to be modernized, including the Trave Campus in Lübeck, more continuing education and support for gifted trainees; schools are to work more closely with local businesses. Municipal business law is to ensure fair competition with municipally owned companies, and procurement rules are to let small firms win public contracts too. Development banks such as the guarantee bank and the investment bank are to be strengthened, also to finance business successions. The FDP also wants to fight undeclared work and make sure tradespeople can drive into city centers.

The FDP wants to preserve and expand the state's industrial base. The "Bündnis für Industrie.SH" (industry alliance) is to continue, and new industrial sites are to be made easier through fewer administrative hurdles and adjusted funding tools.

The FDP wants to strengthen industry in the state. Industry offers many well-paid jobs. New factories should be able to set up more easily. For that, there should be fewer hurdles at government offices.

Within the industry alliance, skilled workers are to be trained, land made available and digitalization advanced. The FDP wants to push for affordable energy, stable supply chains and free trade, and to keep industrial value creation in the state. Research spending is to rise and real-world test labs are to be used. The platform sees good conditions for new sites in battery cell research and production.

The FDP wants to expand state support for start-ups and make it possible to found a company entirely online. The platform sees new businesses as a driver of growth and prosperity.

The FDP wants to help people who start a company. The state should give young companies more support. People should be able to start a company fully online. Schools and universities should also teach about starting a business.

The focus is to be on the state's strengths such as health, medical technology, energy, the digital economy, tourism and hospitality. Start-ups and business succession are to be linked more closely. Patent rules for university spin-offs are to become more attractive, and universities are to find it easier to take stakes. Entrepreneurship is to get more room in schools, and universities are to offer more advice for founders, for example through a founding semester. New technologies such as artificial intelligence or robotics are to get special support, and venture capital is to become easier to access in the early phase.

The FDP wants to put the expansion and modernization of infrastructure at the center of its economic policy and of public investment. Funding is to go primarily to infrastructure rather than to individual companies, and fiber-optic internet is to be available almost everywhere in the state by 2025.

The FDP wants to invest mainly in roads, rail, bike paths and fast internet. Public funding should go there rather than to single companies. By 2025, fiber-optic internet should be almost everywhere. Fiber-optic is a very fast internet cable.

The platform names roads, which remain especially important in rural areas, as well as rail and cycling infrastructure. Fiber-optic rollout is seen as the basis for digitalization; the state's lead is not to result in reduced effort. Funding is also to go to commercial zones, the conversion and expansion of ports and tourism infrastructure, including inland. For transport, the FDP promises continued high investment in repair and expansion and says it will not play the different modes of transport off against each other.

The FDP wants state-level spatial planning that responds quickly to new developments and allows easy deviations from plans. Rules on housing development, land take and retail in the state development plan are to be reviewed and loosened.

The state plans where building is allowed. The FDP wants to relax these rules. Towns should find it easier to get land for homes and businesses. Plans should be quicker to change.

Responsibility for state planning would move to the economics ministry, and the FDP seeks joint planning with Hamburg. The experimentation clause in the state development plan is to be used consistently. Regional plans should be lean and flexible and drawn up with local stakeholders. New commercial sites should be possible as needed, and the areas along the state development corridors should be used for growth. For raw material extraction, the FDP wants more sites secured in regional plans and lean permitting procedures.

The FDP wants to shape the change in city centers as shopping habits and working life shift. It relies on housing in city centers, new business and restaurant concepts, and more flexible opening hours.

City centers are changing. Many people now shop online. The FDP wants more people to live in city centers. Shops should be freer to decide when they open.

According to the platform, educational and research institutions could also be located in city centers more often again. Urban development funding should focus more on modern concepts, and the FDP wants to push for this at the federal level too. Modern traffic and parking guidance systems are to be supported, as are online services that represent the city center digitally.

The FDP wants to develop tourism together with the industry and residents and reach first place nationwide in customer satisfaction. To this end it plans a tourism competence center, larger marketing budgets and continued investment in destinations.

Tourism is very important for the state. The FDP wants to develop it further. A new center should advise and connect businesses. Local people should benefit too.

The competence center is meant to help carry out the tourism strategy and foster exchange among the mostly mid-sized businesses, using existing structures where possible. Marketing organizations would get more money, also to explain the benefits of tourism to local residents. The state tourism agency TASH and local agencies are to be strengthened and better networked, including joint offers with Hamburg, Mecklenburg-Vorpommern and Denmark. Inland areas are to be developed through camping, cycling and hiking vacations, and country inns are to be preserved across the state. Further elements are health tourism, co-working spaces for combining work and vacation, and digital tools such as visitor flow management or digital registration forms.

The FDP wants to make Schleswig-Holstein a year-round destination, both on the coast and inland. This is meant to create year-round jobs and make work in restaurants and hotels more attractive.

Tourists should come all year round. Then hotel and restaurant staff have work all year. The FDP also wants to support affordable homes near workplaces. This should make more people want to work in the industry.

The FDP advocates spreading school vacation periods, especially in summer, over as wide a window as possible to improve occupancy. Conference and convention tourism and centrally managed events outside the main season are meant to boost weaker months. For employees, the FDP wants to support affordable housing near the workplace and offers for balancing work and leisure. Tourism is to remain a priority sector in the state's skilled labor initiative.

The FDP wants existing campsites and RV sites to be able to expand and new ones to be designated more easily. The state nature conservation act is to be amended so that very small campsites on farms can be permitted again.

The FDP wants more places for tents and RVs. Small campsites on farms should be allowed again. To do this, the FDP wants to change a state nature protection law.

According to the platform, so-called five-pitch sites currently cannot be permitted because of the state nature conservation act. New pitches are to be created in harmony with nature and infrastructure. The FDP also favors pop-up camping, where unused areas such as large gardens or festival grounds serve as campsites at short notice and with little red tape.

The FDP wants to shape the legal framework for the gambling market so that legal offerings are more attractive than illegal ones. It would check any additional requirements for whether they push players into the illegal market, while strengthening player protection and addiction counseling.

The FDP wants people to gamble with legal providers. So legal gambling should stay attractive. The FDP wants to check new rules carefully. Protection for players should get better. Counseling for gambling addiction should also be strengthened.

The program points to the new Interstate Treaty on Gambling, which legalized online gambling in all states and, according to the FDP, follows Schleswig-Holstein's model. Player protection is to be reviewed and improved on an ongoing basis. The network of addiction prevention and counseling centers is to be strengthened. Gambling revenue is to go to prevention, counseling, consumer protection and sports. The state's revised gaming hall law is to stay in place.