Economic and social benefits of meteorology and climatology in Switzerland

National Meteorological Services provide meteorological data, information, forecasts and various related products, which are important for the smooth functioning of many aspects in economy, administration and society. The merit of meteorological services cannot be deduced directly from the consumption of services. Rather, it emerges from the improvement of decisions by economic stakeholders thanks to weather and climate information. These services are purchased by users in order to be able to offer optimally or demand a certain service or, with respect to security, these services aim at helping to prevent damage from extreme events. A rough estimate for a number of selected sectors shows that benefits from weather services in Switzerland are in the region of hundreds of millions Swiss Francs (1 Swiss Franc ∼ ¤0.66, US$0.83 as at 2008). This pilot study shows that it is not possible to estimate one single figure representing the overall benefit from weather services in a country. Concerning the economic sector, a benefit analysis should therefore concentrate on those subsectors where weather services are particularly relevant, i.e. agriculture, construction, energy, insurance, telecommunication, tourism, transport, logistics and water availability. Analysis of benefits from climate data is of particular interest to MeteoSwiss since the Federal Office is the main source for climate data in Switzerland. Climate data form the basis on which climate change and possible climate threats can be detected. This study estimates for the first time the socio-economic benefits of meteorological and climatic information in Switzerland as a small developed European country and gives an outlook of how a further study might be designed. Copyright  2009 Royal Meteorological Society