Swiss economy to grow faster than expected

Swiss exports to continue benefiting from predicted upturn Keystone

The State Secretariat for Economic Affairs (SECO) has revised its economic growth forecasts for Switzerland upwards, predicting that Gross Domestic Product (GDP) will grow by 2.3% in 2018 after growth of 1% in 2017. 

It had previously forecast 2% for 2018 and 0.9% in 2017. But after hesitant growth in the first half of 2017, SECO saysExternal link the Swiss economy grew substantially in the third quarter of the year and “the upturn became more broad-based”. 

It attributes this to the “stable and broad-based global economic upturn”, which it says is “providing good momentum”. “Economic activities around the world have recently developed at an even faster pace than was envisaged in the last forecast,” it explains. 

SECO experts are optimistic that this will continue in the coming months. “Leading indicators suggest that this high rate of growth will continue internationally as well as in Switzerland,” they say. Exporters are likely to continue benefiting from this robust growth. 

For 2019, SECO predicts that Swiss GDP will grow by 1.9%. 

It expects stronger growth to have an impact on jobs, anticipating a 1.2% rise in employment in 2018 and a further 1% increase in 2019. In the mean-time, the unemployment rate is forecast to drop to 2.9% in 2018 and 2.8% in 2019.