In Switzerland, emissions taxes, such as the one on home heating fuel, do two things. They make it more expensive to pollute and they redistribute income – every resident in Switzerland gets an equal share of the tax collected in the form of a deduction from their health insurance premiums. The redistributive element of this […]
More than 80 centimetres of new snow in some parts of Switzerland
Earlier this week it felt like spring in Switzerland. However, by Wednesday it had turned very wintery in parts of the country and snow continued to fall throughout Thursday, particularly in the Alps. More than 80 centimetres fell in Switzerland’s central Alpine region, an area including the Simplon pass and centered on the Alpine resort […]
Question of the week: is retirement a key driver of climate change?
To make the numbers work, pay-as-you-go state pensions require a high ratio of workers, who pay into the system, to retirees, who get money out. This leads some governments with growing populations of pensioners to push for higher birth rates. However, according to a climate report by Lund University having one less child is the […]
Steep drop in thefts in Switzerland
Comparing 2018 to 2012, thefts in Switzerland fell by nearly half, according to the Federal Statistical Office. In 2012, there were a record 219,000 thefts recorded in Switzerland. By 2018, the figure had fallen to 112,000, a drop of 49%. Over the same period, all categories of theft with the exception of fraud were down. […]
Snow forecast in Switzerland on Thursday
It might feel like spring, however snow is forecast to fall as low as 500 metres in parts of Switzerland this Thursday, according to Swiss Meteo. The metrological service forecasts snow as low as between 600 and 800 metres in French-speaking Switzerland and as low as low as 500 and 800 metres in German-speaking Switzerland. […]
Swiss clocks move forward one hour this Sunday
Early on Sunday 31 March 2019 – at 2am to be precise – Swiss clocks will move forward one hour. This means you will miss one hour of sleep and it will be darker when you get up. On the plus side, it will be lighter for longer in the evenings. Daylight savings likely to […]
Swiss government wants a drone register
Switzerland’s Federal Office of Civil Aviation (FOCA) has decided to further regulate drones by forcing owners to register them, according to the newspaper NZZ am Sonntag. The new requirement, which will probably start in 2020, was suggested in 2017. Drone registration would be done online by the owner. How the police would access the database […]
Second hottest February south of Swiss Alps since records began
February 2019 was unusually hot in Switzerland. According to Swiss Meteo, the region south of the Alps experienced the second highest average February temperature since records began in 1864. The average monthly temperature at the 3,580 metre measurement point on the peak Jungfraujoch was 5 degrees higher than the norm between 1981 and 2010. The […]
Geneva wants to ban free plastic bags
The canton’s government could ban retailers from offering free plastic bags in the canton, according to the newspaper Tribune de Genève. Migros and Coop, Switzerland’s two large supermarkets stopped providing free plastic bags some time ago, so the ban would not affect them. The parliamentary vote, supported by the Green party and PDC, would mainly […]
Campaign launched for a pesticide-free Switzerland
On Monday, a referendum in Switzerland aiming to ban the use of all synthetic pesticides was launched. The popular vote, which collected the required 100,000 signatures in 2016, is scheduled for 2020, according to RTS. The pesticides that would be banned include glyphosate and neonicotinoids, a group of chemicals known to kill bees. Vote organisers […]
