The Swiss are prepared for everything
When it comes to stockpiling for Brexit, the Brits could learn a thing or two from the Swiss. In recent months, British economic data from the manufacturing sector has been very strong as companies increased their inventories of goods to prepare for a potential hard Brexit. The service sector, on the other hand, has been quite soft, since it is hard to stockpile services.
But whatever British companies and the government do, they are no match for the Swiss. The US has its strategic petroleum reserve and Canada the strategic maple syrup reserve , but the Swiss have the “Bundesamt für wirtschaftliche Landesversorgung” or the “Federal Office for National Economic Supply” (FONES). It is an agency established in stages between 1917 and 1938 with the job to ensure an adequate supply of essential goods and services in the event of war or severe shortages that the economy cannot resolve by itself. Amongst other powers, the FONES can, as they say on their website, “depart from the principle of economic freedom”, i.e. they can confiscate goods or force businesses and people to provide certain goods and services, if necessary, for free.
The Swiss have not fought in a war for many centuries, but they are definitely ready for one. The country has more than 300,000 fallout shelters in private homes and public buildings as well as 5,100 public shelters. Together, these bunkers provide enough room for c. 8.6 million people – more than the entire population of Switzerland. Switzerland is so dotted with military installations that there even is a book about bunkers and military installations that are disguised as Swiss chalets with painted windows and other fake trimmings. Our picture shows one example in the Berner Oberland.
Furthermore, there is still a mandatory military service and men aged between 18 and 34 (and in some cases up to the age of 50) must serve in the Swiss army, which brings with it the privilege of keeping your own military rifle at home together with 20 shots of ammunition. Yet, while Switzerland has one of the highest number of guns per capita in the world, its homicide rate is one of the lowest in the world, but that is mostly because it is forbidden to shoot people there. Every year, members of the Swiss military must spend two weeks with the armed forces where they prepare for the attack of the brown army from the north, the red army from the east or the blue army from the west. And the colour-coding is of course completely random…
But I digress. Back to the FONES. That the FONES is taking its job seriously becomes evident to everyone who lives in Switzerland the moment a fresh pack of iodine tablets arrives in the mail every couple of years, together with a leaflet of how to store them and how to use them in the case of a nuclear fallout.
But now the FONES is about to make a crucial mistake. On Wednesday it published a press release saying that it is considering abolishing its strategic coffee reserve. 15 coffee producers in Switzerland (including food giant Nestle) currently have to permanently stockpile 15,300 tonnes of raw coffee beans all over the country – enough to provide all of Switzerland with their daily cuppa for three months. This stockpile is financed with a special tax of CHF 3.75 per 100kg of coffee (creating revenues of c. CHF 2.7m per annum).
Now the FONES argues that the coffee reserve is no longer needed because coffee contains almost no calories and thus is not needed to safeguard nutrition. I am not sure who came up with that idea, but can you imagine 8 million Swiss people cramped together in bunkers all over the country and then someone says: sorry, there is no more coffee? I think the consequences could be worse than not having the bunkers in the first place… Luckily, resistance to this idea is brewing and the FONES has time until November to reconsider its decision.
A Swiss military installation disguised as a mountain chalet
Source: Falsche Chalets