UK-Switzerland enhanced Free Trade Agreement: conclusion summary

Question 1

Introduction

Accepted Answer

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland (UK) and the Swiss Confederation (Switzerland) have concluded negotiations on a new and enhanced free trade agreement (FTA). This builds on the existing goods-focused UK-Switzerland deal, itself based on an EU-Switzerland agreement signed in 1972.

The UK is a services superpower and this deal, estimated to be worth £5.2 billion in additional annual UK services exports in the long run, opens up significant new export opportunities for firms of all sizes^{[footnote 1]}. It will help make it easier for businesspersons to travel to and supply services in Switzerland, embedding certainty into our trading arrangements with a key European partner for years to come.

This agreement marks another significant milestone in this government’s commitment to leverage trade to unlock opportunities for UK businesses, support jobs and deliver economic growth across the whole country. It builds on the deals we have already secured with:

the United States – the biggest economy in the world
the European Union – our biggest trading market
India – the fastest growing economy in the G20
the Gulf Co-operation Council (GCC) – home to sovereign wealth funds (SWF) managing more than 40% of global SWF assets
the Republic of Korea – one of Asia’s most dynamic economies^{[footnote 2]}

The UK government will now work with Switzerland to move swiftly towards signature and implementation of the agreement, ensuring appropriate parliamentary scrutiny, so UK businesses can access as soon as possible the full benefits of this enhanced agreement.

This document explains what has been agreed and the top benefits for UK businesses, with chapter summaries outlining terms.

Question 2

The strategic case for the enhanced FTA with Switzerland

Accepted Answer

Delivering growth across the UK economy is the government’s top priority.

International trade is central to that mission by:

providing opportunity for UK businesses
supporting jobs
raising living standards across the UK

In line with this, the enhanced FTA with Switzerland deepens ties with one of our closest economic partners and our 10th largest trading partner^{[footnote 3]}. The deal opens new opportunities in this high-value, services-driven market, supporting the objectives of the Industrial Strategy, and Trade Strategy.

Switzerland is already one of the UK’s key services partners. It is our sixth largest services export market with over £30 billion in bilateral services trade in 2025^{[footnote 4]}. The agreement builds on this relationship, helping to support jobs across the UK – including the 171,400 already supported by exports to Switzerland^{[footnote 5]}.

Swiss nationals and companies also play an important role in the UK economy, paying taxes, investing in the country and generating economic growth. The Swiss National Bank (SNB) estimates that in 2024, around 150,000 people were employed by Swiss companies in the UK. According to the Swiss Federal Statistical Office, in 2025, around 40,000 Swiss nationals were living in the UK^{[footnote 6]}.

Switzerland is one of the UK’s most important partners in Europe. We share many values based on longstanding historical ties and partnerships in innovation, science and technology, exemplified by the UK’s Sir Tim Berners-Lee inventing the World Wide Web during his time working at CERN in Switzerland.

As world-leading service-based economies, the UK and Switzerland also enjoy a fruitful trade and investment relationship. Total bilateral trade between the UK and Switzerland was worth £53 billion in 2025 and total bilateral foreign direct investment (FDI) amounted to £87 billion at the end of 2024^{[footnote 7]}.

The FTA is a crucial part of an ecosystem of bilateral agreements in recent years to support UK services firms to grow their presence in Switzerland.

It complements the:

Berne Financial Services Agreement which came into force on 1 January 2026 – the agreement covers wholesale financial services markets, and some retail financial services to high-net-worth individuals, where the UK and Switzerland now mutually recognise each other’s regulatory and supervisory regimes for specified financial services
UK-Swiss Recognition of Professional Qualifications Agreement (RPQA) which entered into force on 8 March 2025 – the agreement ensures that UK-qualified professionals in regulated sectors, such as architects and auditors, have a smooth and transparent route for their qualifications to be recognised in Switzerland

Question 3

Main benefits of the enhanced agreement

Accepted Answer

A high-value boost for UK services exports

The enhanced agreement is estimated to unlock £5.2 billion a year in additional UK services exports to Switzerland in the long run^{[footnote 8]}. It secures ambitious commitments that go beyond Switzerland’s previous FTAs which will level the playing field for UK firms when competing with their Swiss counterparts.

This deal is the most significant trade agreement for services concluded by the UK as it includes our most ambitious digital chapter and most comprehensive business travel commitments in an FTA, along with high-ambition outcomes across services and investment.

The agreement will reinforce the UK’s status as a global services superpower and is set to unlock new opportunities in key Industrial Strategy sectors including finance, professional services, life sciences, creative industries and digital technologies^{[footnote 9]}.

With services contributing 81% of UK economic output and 83% of employment, the agreement will help support the sectors critical to delivering growth, investment and long-term economic resilience^{[footnote 10]}.

Locking in data flows to protect and boost digital trade

The UK has secured its most comprehensive digital chapter, which goes beyond Switzerland’s previous precedent. With over 70% of UK-Swiss services trade delivered digitally in 2023, the enhanced FTA secures a critical ask from UK businesses to protect and grow digital trade^{[footnote 11]}.

The deal includes the strongest commitments on both sides ensuring data will continue to flow seamlessly and freely, protected by existing data privacy safeguards in both countries.

The agreement modernises the bilateral trading relationship. It includes modern provisions on electronic contracts, signatures and invoicing and prevents customs duties on electronic transmissions. It also provides robust protections on intellectual property (IP), including safeguards for source code and cryptographic information.

The deal guarantees that unjustified restrictions on the free flow of data cannot be introduced in the future, including data localisation requirements. This will ensure that UK firms are not required to store data unnecessarily on Swiss servers, preventing unexpected costs and making it easier for businesses of all sizes to expand into the Swiss market.

Locking in long-term certainty for UK business

The enhanced agreement delivers long-term certainty for the UK’s services sector. Switzerland has committed, in a range of sectors, to lock in current market access for UK services firms, preventing new regulations that would make it harder to operate.

For the first time in one of their international agreements, any future improvements to market access that Switzerland makes in certain sectors cannot later be reversed. This provides UK firms with a more stable and predictable environment, delivering an important priority raised by UK businesses. This will give businesses on both sides the confidence to plan and invest long-term.

The deal also locks in the right for UK lawyers to provide legal advisory services in foreign and international law in Switzerland without having to requalify. Lawyers rely on being able to deliver their services on a cross-border and temporary basis and this deal provides them with the certainty they need to continue to do so, a key ask from stakeholders including the Law Society of England and Wales.

Supporting British people working in Switzerland

The deal will make it easier and smoother for British and Swiss services firms to undertake short and long-term projects in each other’s countries. This delivers on a key ask from businesses and organisations on both sides at the outset of negotiations, including the KPMG, the City of London Corporation and the Management Consultancies Association.

The enhanced FTA permanently secures the commitments within the temporary Services Mobility Agreement, which is due to expire at the end of 2029. This protects an estimated £700 million in UK services exports to Switzerland per year in the long run that might otherwise have been lost^{[footnote 12]}.

The ability of UK professionals to deliver services in Switzerland for up to 90 days per year without needing a work permit will be retained permanently. Commitments will also provide more clarity about what activities can be undertaken without a work permit or notification in Switzerland, giving businesses more flexibility in determining how to carry out their operations.

We have also made it easier for UK businesses to access Swiss talent and expertise temporarily in certain specific services sectors. This is for up to 3 months through a bespoke, visa-free, short-term supplier route.

The enhanced deal also locks in current rules governing intra-corporate transferees (ICTs). This will ensure skilled UK and Swiss professionals can continue to transfer easily to their company offices across the 2 jurisdictions, ensuring knowledge and expertise can continue to be shared for years to come.

The agreement will also make it easier for graduates in areas like finance, insurance and consultancy to gain a permit to work in Switzerland. Such commitments recognise the role international transfers can play in professional development and training leaders of the future.

A deal championing innovation in the life sciences

The UK and Switzerland are 2 of the world’s most innovative economies and are among the global leaders in life sciences innovation^{[footnote 13]}. The life sciences sector plays a leading role in the UK economy. The Office for Life Sciences (OLS) estimates that in 2023 to 2024, businesses in the UK life sciences industry employed around 360,000 people and generated nearly £150 billion in turnover^{[footnote 14]}.

The UK’s Life Sciences Sector Plan aims for the UK to become the leading European life sciences economy by 2030. The FTA will support this vision. It will commit the UK to maintaining our existing 10-year period of Regulatory Data Protection (RDP), consisting of 8 years of data exclusivity and 10 years of market exclusivity (sometimes known together as ‘8+2 years’ of regulatory data protection).

The FTA will also commit the UK to maintaining up to 5 years of protection for Supplementary Protection Certificates (SPCs). The FTA does not prevent either the UK or Switzerland from increasing their domestic periods of protection.

These standards support the discovery and development of new medicines. This does not change UK legislation or practice. It maintains the existing balance between supporting pharmaceutical innovation and the access of the National Health Service (NHS) to lower cost generic medicines.

Delivering opportunities across the UK

The enhanced agreement will help support services firms across the UK sell and expand into the Swiss market, from major employers in Leeds’s Northern Square Mile and the City of London to specialist services small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) across the country.

It will provide opportunities across all 4 nations of the UK in key industries including:

fintechs in Wales
high-tech industries in Northern Ireland
services sectors in Scotland

By ensuring that Gibraltar’s businesspersons will continue to be able to supply services in Switzerland for up to 90 days a year without a permit, this is the first UK FTA to include specific coverage for Gibraltar from day one.

Surcharge-free mobile phone roaming

The UK and Switzerland intend to include surcharge-free international mobile roaming and further roaming related provisions such as capping wholesale rates, while including safeguards for telecoms operators. Switzerland and the UK continue technical discussions to work through how this is best achieved.

Streamlining trade and business expansion for SMEs and large companies alike

SMEs are the backbone of the UK economy. In 2024, 84% of UK businesses exporting goods to Switzerland were SMEs and under this deal, more tech start-ups and small service suppliers could find it easier to break into Switzerland^{[footnote 15]}.

We have agreed with Switzerland to:

reduce paperwork
simplify licensing and qualification processes
introduce digital payments

This will reduce stress for small UK firms.

For the first time in a trade deal, Switzerland has committed, in a number of sectors, not to introduce requirements for UK firms to hire a percentage of Swiss nationals for their Swiss subsidiary.

The deal also provides greater certainty for investors by preventing a range of future restrictions on how UK businesses can operate, grow and manage investments in Switzerland. This gives firms the confidence they need to navigate the market.

The deal simplifies exporting processes for UK businesses through paperless trading, including customs and origin declarations. The FTA also includes commitments on transparent, predictable and efficient customs procedures that will help facilitate trade at the border. This could benefit businesses of all sizes – from growing SMEs to major UK exporters and investors.

Strengthening UK-Swiss investment ties

As 2 dynamic, outward- looking countries, Switzerland and the UK have long invested in each other’s economies, with FDI stock from Switzerland in the UK amounting to £44 billion by the end of 2024^{[footnote 16]}.

The UK and Switzerland have strong investment ties which this enhanced agreement seeks to reinforce. Investors need long-term certainty, and the FTA provides this by ensuring that requirements on hiring, research and development spend and export restrictions will not be imposed in the future across various sectors.

The deal also ensures that, in multiple sectors, Switzerland cannot introduce requirements on the nationality of senior managers or board directors of UK companies in the future, allowing firms to hire staff solely on the basis of talent and suitability.

Swiss investment plays a critical role in the UK economy, including from major companies like Zurich UK and Julius Baer. Since 2016, there have been over 500 Swiss greenfield FDI projects started in the UK in key sectors including professional business services and financial services. This includes projects in all nations and regions in the UK^{[footnote 17]}.

The FTA will help make the UK an even more attractive place for Swiss companies to invest and grow their operations, supporting jobs and investment.

Deepening a strategic partnership for the future

The UK and Switzerland are 2 highly innovative nations. The deal establishes a dedicated Innovation Working Group, bringing together businesses, academics and government to identify opportunities, address emerging challenges and shape the future of the bilateral trading relationship.

By creating a structured platform for collaboration, the agreement will help ensure that businesses are at the forefront of developing practical solutions and unlocking the benefits of new technologies.

The enhanced agreement is also designed to be future-facing, with provisions that allow it to evolve alongside global developments and emerging technologies. This will help ensure that the trading relationship remains well positioned to support innovation-led growth in the years ahead.

The deal also delivers strong copyright protections, providing UK creators and publishers with greater certainty that their work will be protected in Switzerland and supporting the continued export of UK creativity around the world.

Beyond its commercial benefits, the agreement deepens co-operation on shared priorities. It strengthens commitments to work together on global challenges, including climate change, development and gender equality, helping to deliver a more modern, inclusive and future-focused UK-Switzerland relationship.

Question 4

Chapter summaries

Accepted Answer

Services and investment

Cross-border trade in services

The FTA includes wide-ranging commitments on services to ensure UK firms trading across a variety of sectors will not face new barriers to trade with Switzerland in the years ahead.

The agreement delivers on important business asks, locking in existing levels of market access in sectors including accountancy, transport and consultancy. This will provide long-term certainty for UK suppliers when they export to Switzerland.

UK businesses from a wide range of services sectors will not be treated less favourably than Swiss service suppliers, now or in the future. In a first for Switzerland in an FTA, UK businesses in these sectors will never be required to establish a physical presence in Switzerland to supply services there.

These measures ensure a level playing field and reduce costs, particularly for the UK’s many start-ups and scale-ups working remotely and delivering services without a physical presence in Switzerland.

Switzerland has committed for the first time in an FTA to include a ‘ratchet’ mechanism for certain sectors including, for example, financial auditing and patent attorney services.

Where Switzerland makes its market more open in the future, for these sectors, it cannot later withdraw those improved conditions from UK businesses. This gives firms confidence that additional future gains in market access will be sustained.

Domestic regulation

Domestic regulation streamlines paperwork and processes that UK firms and professionals need to undertake to obtain permission to do business in Switzerland. This could include applying for a licence or proving that they satisfy professional qualification requirements for a Swiss authority before supplying a service or investing in the country.

We have agreed that, if relevant Swiss authorities – federal, cantonal or municipal – require a UK professional or business to obtain permission, they must, for example:

promptly publish information online explaining what someone applying needs to do
start processing applications as quickly as possible
make sure the processes are clear and not overly complicated

The UK and Switzerland have agreed their best ever commitments in any trade deal on these issues to reduce red tape for UK businesses. As a result, any licence or qualification requirements that businesses need to undertake to enter either of our markets must be proportionate.

Provisions on ‘non-services’ industries have been agreed for the first time by Switzerland in an FTA, including manufacturing, energy, mining, and agriculture. This means that UK businesses in these industries will also benefit from simpler licence and qualification processes as those in services sectors.

In another FTA first for Switzerland, they have also agreed to guarantee that licences or qualification fees can be paid electronically, rather than needing to send a cheque in the post or pay in person. The Swiss have gone further in this agreement on digitalisation than with any other country on allowing these processes to be completed online and entirely remotely from the UK.

Taken together, these commitments ease the regulatory burden on businesses which could significantly reduce time and costs for UK firms, particularly SMEs, start-ups and scale-ups looking to enter the Swiss market.

The commitments agreed do not compromise the UK’s ability to regulate, including in critical public services.

Professional business services

The FTA will support the UK in maintaining its position as a world-leader in professional and business services.

The agreement will guarantee UK lawyers’ rights to provide legal advisory services in foreign and international law in Switzerland using their UK qualifications and titles. This will cover arbitration, mediation, and conciliation services. The agreement will also ensure that UK lawyers are not required to register with Swiss competent authorities or professional bodies when supplying these services.

In 2023, the UK and Switzerland signed a RPQA, which entered into force on 8 March 2025, replacing interim arrangements following the UK’s exit from the EU.

Under the existing RPQA, UK-qualified professionals in regulated sectors, such as architects and auditors, have a smooth and transparent route for their qualifications to be recognised in Switzerland, and vice versa.

It also sets out a bespoke route to recognition for certain legal professionals, providing a route for qualified lawyers to become qualified in the other country subject to meeting the conditions set out in the RPQA.

The combined commitments across the FTA and RPQA represent one of the most comprehensive sets of arrangements that the UK has agreed for the professional and business services sectors. These agreements will provide clarity and certainty for UK professionals looking to export their services to Switzerland. 

Digital trade

The digital trade chapter is the most comprehensive that both the UK and Switzerland have ever agreed in an FTA. It includes the strongest commitments from both sides to enable trusted data to flow and prevent unnecessary data storage requirements.

The FTA includes ambitious measures to help protect and grow digital trade, supporting over 70% of trade in services between the UK and Switzerland delivered digitally in 2023^{[footnote 18]}.

The UK and Switzerland have agreed robust commitments to preserve an open regulatory framework for cross-border data flows, in line with the UK’s best outcome in any of its FTAs.

This will guarantee businesses in the UK will not face any unjustified restrictions on the free flow of data in the future, including costly and burdensome requirements to store their data locally in Switzerland. It provides firms that rely on the free flow of data long-term certainty to trade with Switzerland.

Alongside these commitments, the chapter commits the UK and Switzerland to protect personal data, supporting trust in our digital economy^{[footnote 19]}.

Commitments have also been agreed in the FTA to facilitate paperless trading, digital payments, electronic commerce and co-operation on vital areas such as artificial intelligence.

This will enable firms to trade digitally in a smooth and seamless manner. It will also maintain enough flexibility to proactively support the development and use of emerging forms of technology and digital trade in the future.

Under the digital chapter, UK firms will also benefit from strong commitments against the forced disclosure of their source code of software or cryptographic material as a condition for doing business in Switzerland.

The commitments on source code, which will also benefit Swiss firms in the UK, represent the most ambitious outcome Switzerland has agreed in any of its FTAs to date, and deliver on an important priority for businesses.

Investment

The UK stands to benefit from Switzerland’s most ambitious commitments on investment. The modern and comprehensive investment provisions secured in our deal guarantee stable and welcoming conditions for investors and support the wider ecosystem of trade between our 2 countries.

At the end of 2024, the stock of FDI from the UK in Switzerland was £42.6 billion and the stock of FDI from Switzerland in the UK was £44.0 billion^{[footnote 20]}.

For the first time ever in an FTA, Switzerland has taken comprehensive investment liberalisation commitments for UK investors in non-services sectors, such as clean energy infrastructure, agri-tech, and manufacturing. This will benefit UK firms by banning restrictions such as quantitative limits (such as, a cap on how many businesses can operate in a given sector).

The FTA ensures a level playing field for UK investors operating in Switzerland. In another first, Switzerland has committed, in a wide range of sectors, to never introduce a host of potential barriers to UK firms seeking to grow or effectively manage their businesses in Switzerland.

This includes ensuring investors in those sectors can run their businesses freely by banning requirements such as forced local hiring, domestic content requirements, and other restrictive conditions on how investments operate – ensuring flexibility over business planning and supply chains.

Switzerland has committed not to introduce new nationality restrictions on senior management or board positions across most sectors of the Swiss economy. They have also committed, in most sectors, to never require more than one Swiss company director or equivalent for UK companies operating in Switzerland.

This agreement does not include Investor-State Dispute Settlement (ISDS).

Telecommunications

In a boost for visitors and businesses, the parties intend to include surcharge-free international mobile roaming and further roaming-related provisions such as capping wholesale rates, while including safeguards for telecoms operators. Switzerland and the UK continue discussions to work through how this is best achieved.

Digital connectivity and a thriving telecommunications sector are fundamental to a strong and future-proofed trading relationship. The FTA’s telecommunications provisions will benefit telecommunications operators and customers alike, by containing pro-competitive principles including transparency and non-discrimination, preventing suppliers from acting in an anti-competitive way and supporting greater market competition, and ensuring a fair and effective regulatory environment.

Financial services

UK financial services exports to Switzerland have grown in recent years, and now represent nearly 20% of all our services exports to Switzerland^{[footnote 21]}. The FTA reflects the importance of this sector to the UK and Swiss economies with broad and ambitious commitments in line with the best cross-border market access commitments the UK and Switzerland have taken to help protect and grow financial services trade.

The deal locks in the ability of UK firms to supply financial services into Switzerland, whether from the UK or by establishing a presence in the market. The deal guarantees the ability of UK financial services firms to transfer financial data across borders when supplying financial services to Switzerland-based clients.

In an unprecedented move, Switzerland has agreed to a commitment that prohibits the introduction of nationality requirements for senior personnel and confirms that no more than a minority of board directors may be required to be resident in the territory where they operate.

The deal also includes a new commitment prohibiting the localisation of collateral, meaning cross-border reinsurance firms will not be required to hold collateral in the country where they provide services.

The deal supports UK financial services firms to operate efficiently and reduce costs by locking in their ability to offshore back-office functions (such as HR, IT and administration) so it is no longer required to have these located in-country. This may be particularly important for businesses during the first few years of expansion and could benefit SMEs looking to expand to Switzerland.

These outcomes deliver ambitious commitments that complement the Berne Financial Services Agreement. This agreement covers wholesale financial services markets, and some retail financial services to high net worth individuals, where the UK and Switzerland now mutually recognise each other’s regulatory and supervisory regimes for specified financial services.

This means that a firm based in the UK will be able to serve clients in Switzerland while largely following UK rules, and vice versa.

Entry and temporary stay of businesspersons

Business travel between the UK and Switzerland is important to our bilateral trade relationship. There were around 200,000 business visits and around 600,000 non-business visits by UK nationals to Switzerland in 2024^{[footnote 22]}.

Direct flights to Switzerland are available from numerous airports across the UK, including Newquay, Manchester, Glasgow and Belfast, as well as London airports.

Improving current arrangements on business mobility was a priority for the negotiations. The agreement delivers on this, including some of the most ambitious and comprehensive commitments on business mobility for both Switzerland and the UK. It provides businesses and professionals with greater certainty, flexibility and opportunity when operating across both markets.

The FTA secures and builds on the UK-Switzerland Services Mobility Agreement. It improves arrangements for UK businesspersons, such as, Graduate Trainees and ICTs, and locks in existing commitments on a permanent basis.

This includes long-term certainty that the current arrangements which allow UK businesspersons to travel to Switzerland to deliver services for up to 90 days per calendar year without a work permit will continue. This removes uncertainty for businesses planning their operations and supports service suppliers to work flexibly across borders with confidence.

UK businesses will also benefit from enhanced commitments on medium and long-term business mobility in Switzerland. This includes first-of-their-kind commitments in a Swiss FTA to help Graduate Trainees gain experience in other offices in both countries. This will help nurture UK talent and allow businesses on both sides to build and nurture their young workforce.

Switzerland has also ensured contracts by UK service suppliers in key sectors such as legal, architecture and engineering, can be delivered for several months. To encourage inward investment and support UK growth, Switzerland has agreed commitments on investor mobility for the first time in an FTA, facilitating business establishment and expansion for UK and Swiss businesses.

Switzerland will benefit from visa-free travel for highly-skilled workers to deliver services in key sectors in the UK for up to 3 months, strengthening the bilateral trading relationship. Taken together, these commitments give businesses the tools they need to trade, invest and grow more easily across both countries.

Intellectual property

The UK and Switzerland are 2 of the world’s most innovative countries^{[footnote 23]}. Our high standards of protection and enforcement of IP provide the framework for innovation and creativity.

Commitments on IP in the FTA reflect our shared leadership in this area. The agreement will include obligations across a comprehensive set of IP rights which will go beyond the existing international treaties, including on copyright, designs, geographical indications, patents, trademarks, and trade secrets, as well as robust enforcement measures.

The UK and Switzerland will commit to maintaining existing balanced IP protections for pharmaceuticals. This goes beyond any prior UK or Swiss FTA. The commitments include maintaining a 10-year period of RDP, consisting of 8 years of data exclusivity and 10 years of market exclusivity, sometimes known together as ‘8+2 years’ of regulatory data protection.

The FTA will also commit the UK to maintaining up to 5 years of protection for SPCs, with the flexibility to increase the maximum term available. The FTA does not prevent either the UK or Switzerland from increasing their domestic periods of protection.

Regulatory approval is required to sell a pharmaceutical product in the UK. SPCs compensate for the delay incurred in gaining this approval.

RDP provides protection to an innovator’s clinical trial data for a certain period. During this period of protection, the innovator has exclusive rights to market a new medicine before other companies can begin to market lower-cost, generic versions of that medicine. This incentivises the creation of new medicines by allowing innovative pharmaceutical companies to recoup the high costs involved in research and development.

This will provide confidence to innovative pharmaceutical companies looking to invest in the UK, supporting the vision of the Life Sciences Sector Plan to make the UK the leading Life Sciences economy in Europe by 2030. It does not change the UK’s legislation or practice. It maintains the existing balance between supporting pharmaceutical innovation and the NHS’s access to lower cost generic medicines.

In copyright, this FTA will also lock in comprehensive terms of protection, providing UK creators and publishers with greater certainty that their work will be protected in Switzerland.

Trade in goods

Goods market access

The vast majority of trade in goods with Switzerland is already fully liberalised under the existing continuity agreement and the UK already benefits from tariff-free access across 99% of existing goods trade^{[footnote 24]}. This enhanced FTA builds on that by including additional targeted tariff reductions, producing a balanced outcome for UK exports.

Switzerland has granted the UK benefits for UK exporters across red meat, dairy, horticulture, sparkling wine and seafood. This includes a 0% rate within their World Trade Organization (WTO) quota for sheepmeat. This means British lamb exported under Switzerland’s quota will be tariff free, giving UK lamb producers a tariff advantage over other major exporters.

The UK has secured Switzerland’s best preferential treatment on sparkling wine, reducing the tariff by 34%, meaning British winegrowers will have better access to the Swiss market.

Rules of origin

Benefitting from lower or zero tariffs on goods traded between the UK and Switzerland depends on the goods counting as originating from either country. This is determined by the FTA’s rules of origin. This FTA will make it simpler and quicker for UK businesses to access the FTA’s low or zero tariffs.

New rules mean UK exporters can self-certify by filling out origin declarations instead of needing paper certificates from official bodies. Importers can also use their own documentation instead of an exporter’s origin declaration. This is known as ‘importer’s knowledge’.

The FTA will also retain and update important measures contained in the existing FTA. It will preserve existing product specific rules and update cumulation requirements, maintaining the ability for traders to use inputs from the EU or mutual Pan-Euro Mediterranean Convention on Rules of Origin (PEM) partners in trade between the UK and Switzerland and supporting supply chains.

Customs procedures

The UK and Switzerland have committed to ensuring that customs procedures are simple, efficient and transparent to best support businesses to trade and reduce the burden of administration at the border. 

For the first time in a Swiss FTA, the UK and Switzerland have agreed that goods will be released within 48 hours of arrival at customs, and perishable goods within 6 hours, provided all requirements are met. This matches the commitments the UK has agreed with other important trading partners.

Customs documentation will be simplified, with reduced data requirements and the option to submit customs information electronically.

Traders will have the choice to handle customs procedures themselves, with the use of brokers being optional which will give businesses more flexibility. UK traders can request binding advance rulings on tariff classification, valuation and origin, which will be issued within 90 days. Firms will know in advance how goods will be treated by Switzerland, reducing uncertainty and helping them make informed decisions.

Customs laws, regulations and procedures will be applied in a predictable and transparent way, with relevant information made available online to help traders prepare documentation and reduce the risk of errors or delays.

Sanitary and phytosanitary (SPS) measures

The UK and Switzerland have agreed a modern SPS chapter to reflect the context in which the systems operate in each country. This fills a significant gap as there are no SPS provisions in the existing FTA.

The SPS chapter lowers barriers to trade through co-operative provisions that increase dialogue and make it easier and quicker to resolve any SPS issues that may impact on trade. It includes comprehensive notification commitments, ensuring the UK and Switzerland share important SPS information rapidly and transparently.

The enhanced FTA will account for both the UK and Switzerland’s close SPS relationships with the EU. We have agreed to additional negotiations to further enhance UK-Switzerland SPS arrangements to take place following the successful conclusion of UK-EU negotiations on an SPS agreement.

The chapter delivers among the UK’s most ambitious animal welfare and prescriptive anti-microbial resistance commitments in any FTA, and Switzerland’s most ambitious to date. This positions the UK and Switzerland as global leaders in driving collaborative action to improve animal welfare and reduce antimicrobial resistance internationally.

Switzerland has also agreed to establish a joint Animal Welfare Working Group, which will act as a forum for the UK and Switzerland to work more closely together on animal welfare issues.

Technical barriers to trade (TBT)

The FTA supports trade by addressing TBT on goods. It will help identify, reduce and remove unnecessary regulatory barriers by ensuring robust practices, transparency, and promoting greater regulatory co-operation.

Commitments ensure that regulations are proportionate and no more trade-restrictive than necessary, for instance, championing self-declaration of compliance by businesses as an alternative to independent testing where possible. The agreement also ensures regulations are based on international standards, helping align product requirements with global best practice.

We have agreed commitments on good practice related to product labelling requirements, such as ensuring labelling requirements are minimal, and allowing label corrections and stickering to avoid costly product returns.

Sectoral commitments on mutual recognition of conformity assessment are being merged into a single mutual recognition agreement (MRA). This will add motor vehicles, good laboratory practice, and medicinal products good manufacturing practice inspection and batch testing to the sectors covered by the 2022 MRA.

The result will be a standalone UK-Switzerland MRA separate from this FTA. Businesses can continue to trade and use the standalone MRA in the same way, with the effects of the existing MRA maintained.

The FTA also provides a mechanism for Switzerland and the UK, upon request, to extend between them commitments each has agreed with the EU on technical regulations, standards and conformity assessment.

Trade remedies

The FTA builds on the UK and Switzerland’s rights and obligations under the WTO agreements, providing a clear and robust framework for the use of trade remedies. This will act as a safety net for domestic industry against injury from unfair trading practices, such as dumping and subsidised imports, and unforeseen surges in imports.

This is achieved, where necessary, through measures such as tariffs on specific goods imports, which increase their price and help ensure UK producers can compete fairly or adjust to changing market conditions.

The chapter includes provisions on bilateral safeguards, an FTA-specific mechanism that provides an additional safety net. The bilateral safeguards mechanism will allow either the UK or Switzerland to temporarily increase or suspend tariffs, if it is determined that liberalisation under the FTA has led to a surge in imports that causes or threatens to cause serious injury to their domestic industry.

It also ensures that remedies are applied at a sufficient and appropriate level. Provisions on transparency in investigations are included, as are requirements to apply the ‘lesser duty rule’, meaning that measures must be set at no more than the minimum level necessary to remedy injury to domestic producers.

The UK and Switzerland have also committed to considering the public interest in remedies investigations. This will help to ensure that any measures strike an appropriate balance between remedying injury suffered by producers and avoiding disproportionate effects on other sectors, consumers and the wider economy.

Wider chapters

Government procurement

The FTA will expand market access and improve transparency for UK companies bidding for Swiss government procurement contracts. UK businesses will benefit from the best access in the world to Switzerland’s procurement market – better than any other country or trading bloc, including the EU.

The deal includes extensive coverage of Switzerland’s procuring entities, across federal government, cantons, and municipalities.

Modernised procurement procedures will make it easier and cheaper for UK firms bidding for opportunities in Switzerland. These include new commitments to promote the use of electronic means throughout the procurement process and to look at how opportunities can be made more accessible by breaking down language and geographical barriers.

As well as locking in the UK’s and Switzerland’s reciprocal coverage under the WTO Agreement on Government Procurement (GPA), the FTA enhances the coverage of sectors provided to UK businesses through the continuity agreement.

The sectors are:

railway operators
heat and gas networks
private utility companies

Access to these sectors is only otherwise available to the EU. The FTA also guarantees new access for the UK to several procurement sectors, including legal services, real estate services, and taxation services – giving UK businesses the best access in the world to the Swiss procurement market.

Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs)

SMEs, including start-ups and scale-ups, dominate the business landscape in the UK and Switzerland, accounting for over 99% of all firms^{[footnote 25]}.

The FTA recognises the importance of SMEs in both countries and takes steps to ensure the deal is as accessible as possible to companies of all sizes. To this end, the agreement includes the most ambitious commitments on supporting SMEs ever agreed by Switzerland in a bilateral trade deal.

To help SMEs navigate the agreement quickly and easily, both countries will publish important information about the agreement on a free, publicly accessible website. This will include the full text of the agreement, summaries, an electronically searchable database for customs information, and links to other useful relevant websites.

Together, these measures could save firms time and resources and ensure they can more easily understand the benefits of the FTA.

The UK and Switzerland have also agreed to work together on SME-related issues. This includes sharing best practice on training programmes, improving access to finance and discussing barriers to trade.

Both countries will also work to identify possible opportunities to further the participation in international trade of SMEs owned by under-represented groups, including women, youth, persons with a disability and minority groups.

Greater co-operation on these issues will help SMEs take a stronger role in UK-Swiss trade and will help support innovation, jobs and inclusive economic growth.

SMEs, start-ups and scale-ups will also benefit from provisions covered in other areas of the agreement. For example, the UK and Switzerland are making it easier for SMEs to bid for government contracts by improving access to information, simplifying processes, and ensuring quicker payments.

Consumer protection

This is the first time that Switzerland has included a standalone consumer protection chapter in an FTA. This will give UK consumers the confidence that their rights are protected when they buy goods or services from Switzerland.

Consumer protection agencies in the UK and Switzerland will work together to protect consumers from unfair practices and provide clear rights to redress if something goes wrong.

Online consumers will be given the same level of protection as those shopping in person, ensuring digital transactions are as safe as those offline. This will support increased trade between the UK and Switzerland and provide a level-playing field for businesses.

Competition, state-owned enterprises and subsidies

The FTA includes commitments to tackle practices that harm competition, such as abuse of market dominance and some mergers. It also ensures the fair and transparent enforcement of competition rules by independent competition authorities. These commitments will make it easier for businesses to trade in and between the UK and Switzerland.

Commitments have also been agreed on state-owned enterprises (SOEs) operating in the UK and Switzerland. This will tackle potentially unfair commercial practices by ensuring that SOEs operate in a non-discriminatory manner and in accordance with commercial considerations. The FTA makes clear that SOEs should observe internationally recognised standards of corporate governance.

Unfair practices on subsidies undermine trust in the rules-based trading system and prevent UK businesses from competing fairly with foreign businesses. The FTA underscores the UK and Switzerland’s shared commitment to the WTO subsidies rules and enables both parties to consult each other if concerns are raised that a subsidy will negatively affect firms.

Transparency

Switzerland has agreed its most ambitious commitments on ensuring transparency and due process in the publication and administration of its trade-related measures.

This chapter commits both countries to a number of principles that are mutually beneficial for our businesses and consumers. This includes publication of information relating to relevant laws and regulations, or proposed changes to them, and sharing information on existing or proposed measures that significantly affect the operation of the FTA. The aim is to make relevant information open and accessible, including online and in an easily accessible format, to users of the agreement.

This will increase opportunities for UK firms to utilise the FTA by making it easier to locate and learn about Swiss rules and regulations.

Core text

The core text chapters provide an effective legal and institutional architecture for the FTA, to ensure that the agreement continues to support economic growth and the expansion of trade and investment between the UK and Switzerland over time.

The preamble places the FTA in the context of the longstanding UK-Swiss relationship and articulates the UK and Switzerland’s shared priorities for the agreement.

Initial provisions and general definitions establishes an appropriate set of legal relationships between the FTA and other international agreements, sets out the geographical scope of the agreement, and defines key terms used throughout the FTA.

 The chapter ensures that the FTA accounts properly for interactions with the Windsor Framework, and that appropriate coverage is provided for the crown dependencies with respect to trade in goods. By ensuring that Gibraltar’s businesspersons will continue to be able to supply services in Switzerland for up to 90 days a year without a permit, this is the first UK FTA to include any coverage for Gibraltar from day one.

The general provisions and exceptions chapter contains a set of exceptions to allow the UK and Switzerland, where appropriate, to take various measures to serve the legitimate public policy objectives set out within the exceptions, even if those measures would not otherwise conform with the commitments made in the FTA.

These flexibilities, including with respect to environmental protection, national security, and the NHS, will protect our domestic policy space and preserve the UK’s right to regulate in the public interest.

The institutional provisions create a joint committee to help ensure the agreement is implemented effectively and to oversee its functioning, as well as various more specialised committees and working groups to cover particular areas. These arrangements will provide for ongoing engagement and co-operation between the UK and Switzerland in matters related to the agreement.

Finally, the final provisions chapter sets out processes for the entry into force, amendment, and, if appropriate, termination of the agreement, and provides a mechanism for the agreement to be further extended to the crown dependencies and overseas territories in future. The chapter will also contain provisions to ensure a smooth transition from the existing UK-Switzerland FTA to the enhanced agreement.

Dispute settlement

The economic benefits of any FTA will only be fully achieved if both sides implement and follow its rules. The FTA includes a strong state‑to‑state dispute settlement process to resolve issues that may arise.

The UK and Switzerland have agreed a modern and comprehensive mechanism to handle trade disputes in a consistent, fair, transparent, timely and cost‑effective way. This balances firm enforcement with a focus on resolving them early.

This mechanism reflects a shared commitment by the UK and Switzerland to uphold the agreement. It helps to protect the deal’s economic benefits, support UK growth and give businesses greater certainty. By providing a clear mechanism for resolving disputes, both sides will be encouraged to meet their commitments.

Innovation

The UK has agreed commitments with Switzerland to maintain and enhance our position as 2 global leaders in innovation.

The FTA establishes a structured route for both countries to proactively capitalise on commercial opportunities arising from the development of innovative products and services and address any trade barriers that may arise from innovation.

A dedicated working group of government representatives will be able to convene as required to foster an open dialogue with experts from across industry, research and academia to:

share best practice
identify challenges and opportunities
respond in an agile way to drive forward innovation

Formal recommendations can be made by the working group to update the FTA, ensuring it remains alive and responsive to challenges and opportunities for trade in innovative goods and services.

These commitments represent the first time Switzerland has ever agreed to specific provisions in an FTA on innovation, signalling its importance to stakeholders in both countries.

Trade and environment, labour, development and gender equality

Trade and sustainable development (TSD)

This FTA includes some of the most ambitious environment and labour commitments ever agreed by the UK and Switzerland.

Switzerland has agreed for the first time in a trade agreement that important commitments, such as not weakening protections and enforcing existing laws, are subject to dispute settlement including arbitration. This provides certainty for businesses that the agreement will support a fair-trading environment.

It requires that the UK and Switzerland cannot weaken or roll back environmental and labour protections to encourage trade or investment between the parties.

The UK has retained its progressive position by locking in firm commitments on multilateral environmental agreements (MEAs). This includes agreement to effectively implement the Paris Climate Agreement, CITES (Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora) and other MEAs.

The UK and Switzerland have also secured firm commitments to uphold International Labour Organization (ILO) standards without needing to prove a direct trade link. The UK has agreed for the first time a commitment to develop and enhance measures for social protection. This means both countries commit to improving support for workers – including on fair pay, working conditions and social security.

Taken together, these commitments, including those on MEAs, and the unprecedented approach on arbitration, make this one of the most leading-edge FTAs on labour and environment, with Switzerland having gone further on enforcement than ever before.

Trade and development

The FTA commitments on trade and development are some of the most ambitious that Switzerland has ever agreed.

This chapter reflects a shared understanding that trade can be a powerful driver of inclusive economic growth, reaffirming parties’ commitment to the sustainable development goals and helping to support prosperity, reduce poverty, and build a more resilient global economy.

Through this agreement, the UK and Switzerland may deliver joint development initiatives, share expertise and best practice, and provide targeted support where it can have the greatest impact. Additionally, the 2 countries may look carefully at how the agreement affects developing countries, to ensure it creates opportunities and avoids unintended outcomes.

By working in partnership in this way, the UK and Switzerland can help developing countries better access and benefit from global trade, while maximising opportunities for sustainable, long-term growth.

Inclusive economic development and gender equality in trade

The agreement supports women to thrive in international trade, with Switzerland signing up to its deepest-ever trade and gender equality commitments.

The UK and Switzerland will work together to tackle barriers, promote fair opportunities such as equal pay and access to leadership roles, and support women to start and grow businesses engaged in trade. Both parties will also share best practice and strengthen co-operation between government and industry.

The UK and Switzerland have committed to improving the collection and use of gender-disaggregated data to better understand where barriers exist and design more effective policies. These commitments are reinforced across the wider agreement, helping ensure trade delivers real, inclusive benefits in practice.

This includes strengthening workplace protections for women and tackling the gender pay gap. It also ensures dispute panels better reflect society, with more women and under-represented groups involved.

Question 5

What happens next

Accepted Answer

Now that negotiations have been concluded, the UK and Switzerland will work together to finalise the FTA text for signature. Following this, the UK’s independent Trade and Agriculture Commission (TAC) will be commissioned to scrutinise the FTA.

TAC will produce a report assessing whether the FTA’s measures are consistent with the maintenance of UK statutory protections in relation to:

animal and plant health and life
animal welfare
the environment

The Food Standards Agency and Food Standards Scotland will similarly assess the maintenance of statutory protection in relation to human health.

Informed by the TAC’s advice (as well as advice from the UK’s food standards agencies) the government will lay its own report under section 42 of the Agriculture Act 2020 (s42 report).

The FTA will then be subject to the usual pre-ratification scrutiny procedures under the Constitutional Reform and Governance Act.

Any legislative changes required to give effect to the agreement will need to be scrutinised and passed by Parliament in the usual ways before ratification can take place. Legislation necessary to implement the FTA will be brought forward and duly scrutinised by Parliament when time allows.

Entry into force will take place once both the UK and Switzerland have completed their ratification processes.

The UK government will then help businesses to benefit from the FTA through the Utilisation Team and Export Support Service. These help businesses understand what has been agreed and what it means for their sector, as well as support them to identify new export opportunities.

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