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Foreign Economic Policy Report 2016 by Swiss Federal Council

February 6, 2017 | Legal Alert

Foreign Economic Policy Report 2016 by Swiss Federal Council

Early this year the Swiss Federal Council released the Foreign Economic Policy Report 2016 highlighting the forthcoming challenges for Swiss foreign economic policy.

As an exporting country, Switzerland is highly dependent on access to foreign markets and is currently facing new challenges in relation to free trade agreements. The Council's Report features the foreign economic policy opportunities as well as the economic environment required to keep Swiss companies competitive and enable them to participate in new markets emerging due to globalisation and digitalisation trends.

As in previous years, the Federal Council sought in the past year to maintain and develop the bilateral agreements with the EU and to further expand the network of Swiss free trade agreements. Concerning new business models, the Report states that regulations will have to be adapted with due regard to new technologies in the financial sector. Further, education policy is to be aligned to new challenges and appropriate infrastructure is required. On the international level, Switzerland is taking due account of the mentioned global developments by participating in interdisciplinary studies and projects on digitalisation in the OECD and by lowering customs duties on information technology products under the plurilateral WTO-agreement "ITA II".

Thus, it can be concluded that the Swiss government is committed to ensuring that policies are put in place to foster growth in the level of digitisation. This means that the digitalisation suppliers, including traditional IT service providers, telecom companies, hardware producers, software developers and Internet players can count on increasing revenues on the Swiss market.

Legal disclaimer. This article does not constitute legal advice and does not establish an attorney-client relationship. The article should be used for informational purposes only.
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