Zurich/Berne, 11.06.2013: On the eve of
the adoption of new EU transparency rules for commodities companies,
Switzerland has now also taken the next political step. As today's decision by
the National Council shows, there is now broad consensus that the Swiss
commodity trading hub needs mandatory transparency standards
The lower house of the Swiss
parliament today reported a vote of 93:77 on a proposal that its Foreign
Affairs Committee approved with a clear 17:6 vote at the end of April. The
approved proposal welcomes in the legal basis for transparent financial flows
in the commodities sector and explicitly requires the Swiss government to
consider whether the entire industry should be included in scope. The
parliament has its finger absolutely on the button: until now there was a
danger that the Federal Council would enact only superficial legislation,
riddled with holes and containing no new benefits for the producing countries.
But Justice Minister Simonetta Sommaruga explicitly confirmed in today’s
debate: "The Federal Council accepts the proposal, as it is formulated,
and will now consider transparency rules for the whole sector, meaning for
listed and non-listed commodity companies as well as for commodity trading and
extractive activities."
As an analysis (in French) by Berne
Declaration on transparency within the commodity sector shows,
the extractive activities of all major Swiss commodity companies are most
likely covered by EU and/or U.S. regulations. However, a huge gap still exists
when it comes to commodity trading, for which Switzerland is the world leader,
with almost half of global sales in this US 1900-billion-dollar market being generated
by companies having their principle place of business in Switzerland, and
another 29 percent by companies with key Swiss offices. The importance of its
commodity trading hub goes hand in hand with Switzerland’s political
responsibility to provide quickly and sustainably for more transparency in this
business.
The increasing pressure on
Switzerland is also reflected in the recent success of international
transparency efforts. For example, EITI, the leading transparency initiative
for commodity-producing countries, has recently decided to adopt stricter
rules. Now all EITI member countries are required to put all relevant facts and
figures concerning licenses and commodity trading transactions on the table.
Complementary to this, greater transparency is being achieved in more and more
home countries of commodity companies. Tomorrow, the European Parliament will
adopt the new EU transparency
rules for commodity companies, which were agreed in April. The
Canadian government has, for the first time, also expressed a positive attitude
towards mandatory transparency rules. The USA led the way here in 2012. And the
UK has declared the issue a top priority for the G8 summit next week.
For more information, please
contact:
Oliver Classen, Berne Declaration,
+41 44 277 70 06, oliver.classen[at]evb.ch
Lorenz Kummer, Swissaid, +41 79 307
25 92, l.kummer[at]swissaid.ch
Source: Berne Declaration: http://www.evb.ch/en/p25021487.html
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