Metro continues its global expansion, focus on Asia, Central and Eastern Europe

Russia, Croatia and Vietnam are today three important countries for German commerce giant Metro AG. They are the next goals for Metro's global expansion, which has recently taken the company also to Japan. In China, Metro is planning to have 16 of its successful cash and carry wholesale hypermarkets. Also India is on the expansion programme.

The most internationalised part of Metro AG is in fact its cash & carry operations. Metro Cash & Carry is present in 20 countries and has an annual turnover of over 21 Billion Euro (19 Billion USD). The electronics markets Media / Saturn have also been profitable and continue expanding also outside the German home market. The newest international part of Metro AG is the department store company Kaufhof, which recently bought Belgium's Inno and is preparing to refurbish the stores to its successful Galleria concept.

Will Real be sold to Wal-Mart?

Metro's hypermarket chain Real has been regularly mentioned as a possible take-over object for the American commerce giant Wal-Mart. It has been said that Metro could sell Real next year, when new tax legislation in Germany make it more attractive for the main owners to turn their shares to money. This has, however, been denied by management. Real, which has not been doing so well, is present in Germany, Poland and Turkey.

The Metro workers are well organised in most European countries. In Germany, Metro is one of the strongest membership bases for Ver.di, the new Uni-affiliated commerce and service sector union. The most recent organising successes in Metro have been registered in Poland, where Solidarnosc has been able to recruit more than 2,000 Real workers during the last two years. Uni Commerce is supporting this organising campaign and has placed a full time organiser in the Polish union.

Trade union rights yes - but not in Turkey

Metro is one of the companies, which in general respect trade union rights. Uni Commerce meets regularly with management and problems can usually be solved. An exception is Turkey, where a union-busting campaign has been waged for the last years by an extreme country management, which the German headquarters has been unable or unwilling to get under control. This is a rather peculiar situation.

The European works council in Metro - Euro-Forum - has been in place already for two years. It consists of representatives from all European countries, whether they are European Union member states or not. This agreement was negotiated between Uni-Europa Commerce and the company, with support from the German commerce unions.

Last November, the Euro-Forum proposed to Metro that an agreement be concluded on combating racism and xenophobia. The issue is very important all over Europe and many large German enterprises have been very active in this connection. In the European social dialogue for commerce, an agreement on this issue was signed last year. Therefore it was a surprise for the worker representatives that management of what is Europe's second largest commerce company flatly refused negotiations. The proposal will surely be raised again at the next meeting, later this year.