On Friday, 10 February 2023, the Bundestag voted on a law to accelerate important infrastructure projects. Bitkom President Achim Berg explains:

“The law to accelerate significant infrastructures misses the opportunity to give additional impetus to mobile phone and broadband expansion as well. Whether new masts or new lines: In Germany, it takes up to 14 months for a building application to be approved. We need to streamline the bureaucracy and massively speed up the procedures for network expansion. The expansion of digital infrastructures is of outstanding importance for Germany’s economic and social development. The proclaimed new “German pace” must also apply to the expansion of telecommunications networks.

The mobile internet is an integral part of our everyday lives. In the past five years, data volumes have increased by an average of 50 percent per year. Consumers, local authorities and businesses have high expectations of universal mobile phone coverage without dead spots. Be it in the area of logistics or for traffic control, in the optimisation of urban services or smart farming in rural regions: Telecommunications networks increase energy efficiency and promote sustainability and climate protection. They thus contribute directly to the energy transition and should benefit fully from the facilitations, such as those being developed for wind power plants.

The expansion of digital infrastructure must be significantly accelerated in Germany – the Federal Government and the Länder must take up this project in their planned acceleration pact at the latest.”