Tag Archives: 3.) Swissinfo Business and Economy

Around 10% of Swiss homes are equipped with air-conditioning systems. Istvan Balogh / Alamy Stock Photo More intense and frequent heatwaves have caused demand for air conditioning to skyrocket, even in temperate countries like Switzerland. But there is a catch: the cooler the buildings, the warmer the planet. This summer will be hotter than usual. That’s according to a forecast made by the Federal Office of Meteorology and Climatology (MeteoSwiss) at the end of May,...

The pool of Swiss IT specialists is almost dry © Keystone / Christian Beutler The Swiss economy has recovered well from the Covid-19 crisis, but despite the free movement of people agreement with the EU, some sectors are struggling to recruit qualified staff, says a government report. The unemployment rate in spring 2022 returned to its pre-pandemic level for both Swiss and foreign employees, according to the 18th report of the Observatory on the Free Movement of...

Authorities have raised the spectre of winter rationing, should supplies be disrupted. © Keystone / Christian Beutler The president of the Swissgas industry platform says Switzerland is not aware of how fragile the situation is and that “it would not take much” to lead to a winter shortage. André Dosé told the External linkNeue Zürcher ZeitungExternal link (NZZ) newspaper on Thursday that looming gas shortages elsewhere in Europe and exploding prices amounted to a...

Empty supermarket shelves in Pokrovsk, Ukraine, on July 2 Keystone / Orlando Barria Switzerland will double its aid to Ukraine to CHF100 million ($104 million) by the end of 2023, Foreign Minister Ignazio Cassis announced at the Ukraine Recovery Conference in the Swiss city of Lugano. He also freed up CHF15 million to support the country’s digital economy. “Ukraine has to lead [its reconstruction] but we have to support it,” said Cassis, who also holds the rotating...

The price of household goods for Swiss consumers rose 3.4% in June compared to the same month last year, led by the surging cost of fuel and heating oil. “Inflation, which has de facto been absent for more than a decade, is back with a vengeance,” said economic forecast group BAK Economics. “However, this is no reason for inflation or stagflation [rising prices combined with slower economic output] panic.” BAK Economics is confident that a number of factors will...

Physicists are hoping for new discoveries by ramping up the energy for the Large Hadron Collider. © Keystone / Laurent Gillieron Ten years after it discovered the Higgs boson, the world’s biggest particle accelerator is poised to smash together protons at record energy levels at the CERN particle physics laboratory near Geneva, as scientists resume their search for clues to the origins of the universe. The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) will get back to work on July 5,...

Sommaruga (left) during the opening of a water power plant at Nant de Drance in the Swiss mountains last month. © Keystone/Laurent Gillieron Energy Minister Simonetta Sommaruga has warned of possible shortages of natural gas in Switzerland during the winter months. She said the government prepared made plans to prevent energy blackouts due to a drop in Russian gas imports in the context of war in Ukraine. But it was impossible to guarantee sufficient supplies for the...

Irina Zubchenko walks with her dog Max amid the destruction caused after shelling of a shopping center in March 2022, in Kyiv, Ukraine. Keystone How to set Ukraine on the path to recovery will be the focus of a major international conference hosted by Switzerland in Lugano in early July. But that may be easier said than done with war still raging in parts of the country and lingering concerns about corruption. “Priority number one remains ending the war, because...

Some Western countries plan to officially ban gold imports from Russia. In 2021, Russia dug up 314 tonnes of gold, nearly 10% of the metal mined globally. Ria Novosti An unexpected spike in Switzerland’s gold imports from Russia is under scrutiny as the leaders of the world’s wealthiest nations gear up to introduce a ban on the precious metal. The G7’s focus on gold, Russia’s second-largest export after energy, marks the latest effort by Western nations to ramp up...

New technologies, developed to improve our society, are increasingly being used to wage war. Switzerland, which leads the development of autonomous drones, is very much affected by this phenomenon. But regulating it is very difficult and requires a joint effort by the international community – a tall order when interests collide. The war in Ukraine has emphasised that all innovations can have both civilian and military applications. It’s a two-way street that has...