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That sounds dramatic: “Many hotel, catering and travel agency employees, currently facing part-time jobs due to poor sales, are considering a career change,” says Monika Bandi Tanner in an interview with the agency. AWP news. Bandi Tanner is co-director of the Center for Tourism Research at the Center for Regional Development at the University of Bern.
“It looks like the job market could balance out somehow through natural fluctuation, but there will still be layoffs,” Bandi Tanner said. This is more likely to affect cities and destinations with the guest focus on remote markets such as the United States, the Gulf States, or Asia.
55,000 jobs lost
“The situation is worrying,” says Karin Sieber, spokesperson for the umbrella association Hotellerie Suisse, in the same voice. “The proportion of employees in the hotel industry is only 1.5 percent of total employment in Switzerland. Of the nearly 55,000 jobs that were lost in the second quarter, a good 10 percent was attributed to the accommodation sector. “
In western Switzerland alone, 10 to 15 percent of the roughly 30,000 people employed in the hotel industry – that is, around 3,000 to 4,500 people – have lost their jobs, says Stefano Brunetti Imfeld, president of the Association of the Lausanne Hotel Industry.
And based on a study by the University of Zurich’s KOF economic research institute, the outlook for the third quarter remains bleak. “The outlook for hotels and restaurants is negative and further job cuts are expected,” says Sieber of Hotellerie Suisse.
Only 24 percent utilization
He still didn’t want to make any concrete predictions. The hotel occupancy rate in the largest cities in July alone, still reaching 24 percent after 76 percent in the previous year, suggests that more cancellations can be expected, even if there are regional differences.
In the area of public transport, destinations with a strong focus on Asian or North American guests in particular suffer more than those already geared towards Switzerland by Corona, explains Bruno Galliker, spokesperson for the umbrella association of public transport and cable cars in Switzerland. He points out that there are big differences between various tourist attractions.
“Big peaks, like the Jungfraujoch, have suffered severe losses, while other destinations have had a better summer than usual.” The Titlis Mountain Railways, for example, were also hit hard by the crown crisis and have been able to host far fewer guests than expected since they reopened in early June. Since then, sales have ranged between 20 and 30 percent compared to previous years.
Deutsche Bahn has not ruled out individual layoffs for the fall. After all, there are no mass layoffs in view of winter.
Switzerland reduced by 1,400 jobs
Aviation is also being hit hard. As is well known, Swiss wants to cut costs by 20 to 25 percent. It seems anything but certain that this can succeed as planned without layoffs. According to the Swiss Association of Public Service Personnel VPOD, more than 1,400 of the 9,500 jobs in Switzerland are at risk.
At Easyjet, slack must also be bridged with a short-term job for the 1,000 employees in Switzerland. However, there is no doubt that many jobs in companies near the airport are also likely to disappear, such as catering, ground handling and baggage handling services.
In travel agencies, around 3,000 of the almost 8,200 jobs in Switzerland are at risk. This is the estimate of the Swiss Association of Travel Agents. Its president, Max Katz, sees the existence of many healthy, no-fault companies threatened, as he told AWP.
Avoided wave of layoffs
According to Tanner from the University of Bern, the measures in the field of short hours and Covid loans have contributed to limiting and delaying the damage caused by the crisis. “So far a wave of layoffs in tourism has been avoided.” However, it assumes that there will be changes in the city’s hotel industry and in travel agencies in particular.
Gian Reto Caduff, Head of the Office for Industry, Commerce and Labor (KIGA) of the canton of Graubünden, does not want to miss the support measures adopted. They would have contributed to limiting the number of unemployed in the transport, catering and hotel industries.
100 francs per tourist
The Canton of Valais, for its part, helped the tourism sector with a promotional campaign and spent a total of 16 million francs on it. Restaurants, railways and sports shops in particular should benefit from the 100 franc vouchers that were distributed, as explained by Christoph Juilland of the Valais Employment Observatory (OVE).
According to figures from the Federal Statistical Office, the tourism sector in Switzerland employs more than 170,000 people, more than half of whom work in restaurants or hotels. (pbe / SDA)
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