Tuesday, December 15, 2020

Pros and Cons of Swiss WTO Membership

 Switzerland has a very complicated relationship with the World Trade Organization. while technically a member since 1995, even today, less than 20% of its trade is in what is called preferential nations, and it maintaining, in some industries, tariffs of more than 100%. These factors are largely due to Switzerland holding on to many traditional trade practices and retaining historical trade partners. Most of Switzerland's trade is either with Liechtenstein or the EU and what is not mostly goes to countries in the European Free Trade Agreement. As with its tariffs, over the last 20 years, many tariffs have fallen, but tariffs in agriculture still average at 30% with some industries such as vegetables, meat, and dairy products having tariffs over 100%. This has allowed Switzerland to enjoy some benefits of the WTO without fully putting in its fair share. With this, the Swiss Frank has stayed strong even with the decline of the Euro in the early 2010s while this has been good for domestic markets (it encouraged immigration increasing demand) export-focused markets have suffered as with the decline of the Euro, the Frank does not go as far in europian markets.

https://docs.wto.org/dol2fe/Pages/SS/directdoc.aspx?filename=q:/WT/TPR/S355R1.pdf&Open=True


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