Short-time work at BASF SE in Ludwigshafen as of June

As announced in April, BASF has assessed the workload at the production plants at the site in the past few weeks. Based on this assessment and the provisional agreement made with the Works Council in January, discussions with the responsible employee representatives were held to determine where, to what extent and which form of short-time work should be introduced.

The number of hours worked will be reduced by between 20 to 100 percent and for up to four months according to the circumstances at the individual plants. Irrespective of the reduction in working hours, employees will receive a net wage of approximately 90 percent as a result of short-time work compensation provided by the German government as well as a payment from the company under the terms of the collective wage agreement for the chemical industry. Rapid reintroduction of normal working hours is possible at any time, should demand for BASF products pick up.

“Capacity utilization rates at many plants have remained very low since the beginning of the year, and we do not expect any improvement over the summer months,” said Dr. Harald Schwager, member of the Board of Executive Directors of BASF SE responsible for Human Resources and head of the company’s Ludwigshafen site. “Short-time work is an appropriate measure to temporarily bridge the decline in orders. We are also continuing to use the advantages offered by our Verbund and are temporarily transferring employees to other units or using flexible time to respond to the decline in work volume. Without these measures, short-time work would have already been introduced for thousands of BASF employees in Ludwigshafen.”

As already communicated, the company is also examining further possible measures in the event that business does not improve in the second half of the year. Currently, 5,200 employees from BASF Group companies at 19 sites in Europe are already working short time (including former Ciba sites.)

About BASF

BASF is the world’s leading chemical company: The Chemical Company. Its portfolio ranges from chemicals, plastics and performance products to agricultural products, fine chemicals as well as oil and gas. As a reliable partner BASF helps its customers in virtually all industries to be more successful. With its high-value products and intelligent solutions, BASF plays an important role in finding answers to global challenges such as climate protection, energy efficiency, nutrition and mobility. BASF posted sales of more than €62 billion in 2008 and had approximately 97,000 employees as of the end of the year. BASF shares are traded on the stock exchanges in Frankfurt (BAS), London (BFA) and Zurich (AN). Further information on BASF is available on the Internet at www.basf.com.

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