Cologne – Switzerland is number one in the rankings for location quality compiled by IW Consult. Its strengths include high human capital and a good institutional framework.

IW Consult, a subsidiary of the German Economic Institute, compares the location quality of certain industrialised and emerging countries on a regular basis. In its recently published rankings for 2015, Switzerland is placed first, followed by the USA, Germany, Sweden and Denmark.

The study examines aspects such as governance, knowledge, infrastructure, resources, costs and the market. Switzerland’s particular strengths lie in the fields of knowledge and governance. The latter provides an insight into the institutional framework of a country, focusing on subsets such as legal certainty, corruption, labour market and business regulations as well as the number of business startups. In the knowledge category, indicators cover the available human capital, research environment and employee-employer working relationships.

In an in-depth analysis, IW Consult also examined the development of location factors and industry growth between the year 2000 and 2015. The results reveal that emerging markets are catching up rapidly, with an average of 106 points, compared with just 94 for industrialised countries.  The best development was recorded for China, followed by Romania and Columbia. Switzerland was ranked at number 23, while USA was ranked 40th and Germany at 19.

 

 

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