Sieren's China: Short but intense

At least Sigmar Gabriel won't be jet-lagged. His visit to China was too short for that. Two days were all the Greek crisis allowed. His visit to a BMW factory, which had been scheduled for Friday, was cancelled. Gabriel was needed at home. That's why he didn't even stop at the hotel after landing on Tuesday, but went straight on to sign an agreement. China and Germany plan to work together more closely in the field of modern, digital industrial technologies. And China's minister for industry and information technology, Miao Wei, cautiously said that the step was a "stage victory" and the beginning of a new phase of industrial cooperation between China and Germany.

There followed talks not only with the Minister of Commerce Gao Hucheng in Beijing, but also with Xu Shaoshi, the chairman of the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC). Gabriel called for better market access on behalf of German companies as well as for more protection of current investments. His image among Germany's business community is important to him. Because he, too, wants to be the bosses' comrade. He spoke openly about the disadvantages to German companies.

Despite problems, China still an important market

However, German companies are still realistic when it comes to the weight of Gabriel's words in Beijing. It's difficult enough at home. Business is not that bad between Germany and China, disregarding the current economic downturn, which cannot be blamed on either the Germans or the Chinese. Last year, the two countries traded goods worth over 150 billion euros ($163 billion), making China Germany's most important trading partner outside of the EU and its third largest trading partner overall. In 2014, Germany's exports to China rose by over 11 percent and imports increased by 6.4 percent. This amounts to a third of the volume of goods that EU states trade with China.

Despite the criticism regarding competitive disadvantages, German companies - like all foreign companies in China - know that their growth depends on Chinese consumers. And the past two weeks - during which the Chinese stock market shrunk by about 3.5 trillion dollars - have shown that methods to boost consumption artificially do not always function as desired. Nonetheless, over 50 percent of recently polled German companies in the chamber of international commerce in Beijing expect to reach their goals for 2015, despite the persistent slump in the Chinese economy. The majority of companies registered growth in turnover and profit. It's largely the growth prospects in industry that are keeping investors in China.

Beijing's interest in Greece

Once again, VW, Siemens and co. travelled with the German economics minister. Many of the top managers had two reasons for this: They wanted to speak with him on the plane or at the hotel bar in the evening and they wanted to go with him to see Xi Jinping, the Chinese head of state and the party, since most have not had access to him for some time now. Like his comrades, Gabriel also wanted to talk about the new security law that came into effect on July 1 and has since been heavily criticized in the West because of its arbitrary formulations. Over 100 lawyers and human rights activists were arrested at the end of last week. It was not difficult for Gabriel to find the right tone: criticism, but without getting on the Chinese leadership's nerves. He knows this from the wings of his own party.

Not that Beijing's politicians are interested in what the German vice chancellor and economy minister has to say. They listened politely because Germany is their most important partner in Europe. But they were much more interested in behind-the-scenes information about the agreement with Greece. China plans to expand its investments there. Even if he was not at the forefront of the negotiations, Gabriel knows more about this subject than they do. He was able to capitalize on the fact that the Chinese did not have a better informant and this gave him considerable more value during his short visit to China.

DW correspondent Frank Sieren has lived in Beijing for 20 years.