In the Global Sustainable Competitiveness Index 2019 (GSCI) compiled by the Zurich-based thinktank SolAbility, Switzerland improved by two places from 7th to 5th position in comparison with 2017. Places one to four were taken by Sweden, Finland, Iceland and Denmark respectively, while Germany was ranked in 15thposition and France in 20th. The first non-European countries are New Zealand (12th) and Canada (19th).
Focus on sustainable growth
The GSCI measures the competitive ability of various countries including in terms of the factors that influence sustainable growth. A total of 116 indicators are used that are based on sources of data from the World Bank and International Monetary Fund, for example. The model of sustainable competitive ability is based on the pillars of natural capital, social capital, resource management, intellectual capital and government efficiency.
Switzerland among the best for social capital
In 2019, Switzerland improved from 7th place to 5th place for the social capital metric. It also performed particularly well in the category of intellectual capital (8th). In terms of government efficiency, Switzerland was ranked in 16th place, while it came in 22nd place for natural capital.
