Business Association Chemistry Pharma Biotech
 
Newsletter
June 30th, 2017
   

scienceindustries, the Swiss Business Association Chemistry Pharma Biotech, keeps you abreast of our industry's viewpoints regarding current business and social issues.
 
 
Topics
in this Issue
   
scienceindustries is against economically and politically unacceptable and imperialistic trends  
 
Brexit: Switzerland is on the radar screen of the UK's trade policy  
 
Tax proposal 17 is on the right track from the point of view of Chemistry Pharma Biotech  
 
Employers reject the Pensions 2020 reform  
 
Revision of Swiss chemicals legislation (Chemicals Ordinance, ChemV) is of central importance to Switzerland as a manufacturing base  
 
VOC incentive tax: an unnecessary and expensive bureaucratic monster  
 
Water protection: politics, government, industry and agriculture are working together to reduce plant protection products in small streams  
 
Benefits paid for cooperation between pharmaceutical companies and healthcare providers are disclosed for the second time  
 
Frank Lehmann, Hans Peter Lüthi, Heini Menzi and Alvin Williams were elected as the new members of the Board of scienceindustries  
 
Fritz Grossenbacher was appointed as the new secretary of the Code of Conduct of the veterinary pharmaceutical industry  

 
 
      scienceindustries is against economically and politically unacceptable and imperialistic trends

At the Annual General Meeting of scienceindustries on 19 May 2017, chairman Gottlieb Keller confirmed scienceindustries' commitment to Switzerland as a research and manufacturing base. He also demanded a speedy solution to the corporate tax reform and warned against growing global trends of market foreclosure. For example, the internationally agreed minimum standards for the protection of intellectual property should be included without any compromises in the new free trade agreements. scienceindustries also sharply rebuffed the upcoming Responsible Business initiative, which demands that Swiss companies should be liable for the foreign activities of their subsidiaries and suppliers.
 
 
      Brexit: Switzerland is on the radar screen of the UK's trade policy

Now that negotiations regarding the UK's exit from the EU have started, scienceindustries feels that suitable new and comprehensive agreements are needed as quickly as possible to secure the cooperation between Switzerland and the UK that has to date been guaranteed by the bilateral agreements with the EU. In this way, the UK could be aligned economically with Switzerland by way of a Swiss-UK free trade agreement. scienceindustries participated in a business delegation organised by economiesuisse which has successfully put Switzerland on the UK's trade policy radar screen. According to Liam Fox, UK Secretary of State for International Trade, the planned agreements with Switzerland and South Korea will be given top priority. A scienceindustries working paper summarises the strategic challenges and opportunities of the Brexit process for Switzerland from the point of view of the member companies of scienceindustries.
 
 
      Tax proposal 17 is on the right track from the point of view of Chemistry Pharma Biotech

Following the rejection of Corporate Reform III by the Swiss voters, the Federal Department of Finance is working on a new proposal. For the business sector, the objective of the proposal should still be to abolish the internationally rejected preferential tax regime and to maintain corporate taxation at its current level. The consultation draft should be ready by the end of September 2017, so that Parliament can discuss the dispatch in 2018 and start with implementation in 2019.

The parameters discussed to date confirm that the tax measures important to our industry (patent box and R&D super-deduction) are still included in the proposal in more or less the same form. The maximum tax relief that can be achieved by these measures was reduced from 80% to 70%, but our industry can accept this change. Another positive development is that the cities and cantons will be taken better into account in the reform process. However, the proposal of the Federal Council that the cantons' share in federal taxes should increase to 20.5% only (instead of 21.2%) could harbour some political risk. Criticism should also be levied at the failure to include the notional interest deduction (which is problematic for some cantons when it comes to the financial equalisation scheme), the increase in the partial taxation of dividends to at least 70%, and family allowances as an additional burden on SMEs.
 
 
      Employers reject the Pensions 2020 reform

In March 2017, the Swiss Parliament very narrowly approved the proposal submitted by the conciliation committee for the Pensions 2020 reform. It is widely accepted that the approved proposal and its measures are not enough to ensure the long-term rehabilitation of the pension system. Positive measures include the staggered harmonisation of the retirement age for men and women, the introduction of a flexible retirement age from 62 to 70, and the reduction of the minimum conversion rate from 6.8% to 6%. The general increase in AHV pensions combined with a 0.3% increase in AHV contributions should be described as a negative development. It is also disappointing that the proposal does not include an automatic mechanism to intervene in the event of funding shortfalls or a conditional increase in the retirement age. After studying the proposal as a whole, the Swiss Employers' Association has advised its members to vote against the reform proposal in the referendum on 24 September 2017.
 
 
      Revision of Swiss chemicals legislation (Chemicals Ordinance, ChemV) is of central importance to Switzerland as a manufacturing base

As the current revision of the Chemicals Ordinance focuses on putting additional obligations on companies, the final text of the ordinance is of central importance to the manufacturing industry. scienceindustries commented on the ChemV revision with the following key demands:

There should not be any reporting obligation for intermediate products imported for own commercial use. The expansion of the reporting obligation for nanomaterials brought onto the market (obligation to report materials) and for companies that work with nanomaterials (obligation to report operations) will have an enormous impact on the industry as well as on the enforcement processes of the cantonal authorities. This will create a legal basis which some cantonal authorities believe will be unenforceable due to a lack of resources. Various aspects of the reporting obligations for nanomaterials (and their use) go too far and cannot really be implemented. The definition of nanomaterials as critical substances based exclusively on particle size is rejected. The protection periods for data should be increased to meet EU standards. Switzerland is planning to introduce a unique feature identifier (UFI) system. scienceindustries wants the implementation of a national system to be delayed until the comparable EU system has been finalised. The EU provisions can then be adopted in order to avoid problems with non-tariff barriers to trade.
 
 
      VOC incentive tax: an unnecessary and expensive bureaucratic monster

The National Council approved Walter Wobmann's motion to abolish the VOC incentive tax during the spring session. As the objective of the incentive tax has been reached, the tax is now evolving into an unnecessarily expensive "bureaucratic monster", which scienceindustries believes should be abolished.

Independently of the parliamentary discussions, the FOEN has ordered an analysis of the effects of the VOC incentive tax. This should investigate the administrative costs of implementing the tax for the industry. scienceindustries has been involved in this project from the outset. The FOEN is also working on developing other instruments for the further reduction of VOC emissions. scienceindustries already submitted a constructive proposal in this regard in 2016. First results on the FOEN's study cannot be expected before the end of 2017.
 
 
      Water protection: politics, government, industry and agriculture are working together to reduce plant protection products in small streams

In April 2017, EAWAG, the water research institute of the ETH Domain, published a study on "Pesticide pollution in small streams" and concluded measured concentrations are still critically high and that legal thresholds for water quality are regularly exceeded. The industrial group Agrar immediately responded with a corrective statement, pointing out that the results are not representative and could lead to unnecessary unease among members of the public. The statement also points out that water protection is a key element of the Federal Council's National Action Plan on risk reduction and the sustainable use of plant protection products. All stakeholders, including scienceindustries, are already collaborating actively on this plan.
 
 
      Benefits paid for cooperation between pharmaceutical companies and healthcare providers are disclosed for the second time

As in the previous year, some 60 pharmaceutical companies active in Switzerland disclosed the benefits paid for advisory and other services to healthcare providers on their websites by 30 June 2017. Measured against turnover, this covers more than 80% of the entire Swiss pharmaceutical market. This transparency should reinforce trust in the valuable cooperation between these players and contribute to the high quality of medical care provided to patients.

The exchange between pharmaceutical companies and doctors, pharmacists, hospitals, research institutions and patient organisations is crucial in researching and developing new treatments and therapies for the healthcare sector. New therapies can only be developed and tested and existing therapies improved as part of an ongoing exchange of experiences. This leads to various cooperation partnerships between the industry and healthcare providers, such as joint research projects, speakers at conferences, collaboration on advisory boards, and many more. These diverse activities by healthcare providers deserve to be suitably compensated, and these transfers of value are disclosed once a year. In Switzerland, the Code Secretariat of scienceindustries, the Business Association Chemistry, Pharma Biotech is responsible for the supervision of the PCC. More information is available at www.scienceindustries.ch/pcc.
 
 
      Frank Lehmann, PD Hans Peter Lüthi, Heini Menzi and Alvin Williams were elected as the new members of the Board of scienceindustries

On 19 May 2017 at Siegfried Ltd in Zofingen, the 135th Annual General Meeting of scienceindustries elected Frank Lehmann, Vice President, Global Head of Open Innovation & Venturing, Nestlé SA, PD Hans Peter Lüthi, Laboratory of Physical Chemistry, ETHZ and SCS representative, Heini Menzi, President Givaudan Switzerland Ltd and branch manager of Givaudan Zurich, and Alvin Williams, Vice President, Global Ingredients Purchasing, Firmenich SA as the new members of the Board of scienceindustries.
 
 
      Fritz Grossenbacher was appointed as the new secretary of the Code of Conduct of the veterinary pharmaceutical industry

With the Vet Pharma Code, the veterinary pharmaceutical industry introduced independent self-regulation for the sector many years ago. The Secretariat of scienceindustries has been mandated to implement and enforce the Vet Pharma Code. After some 13 years of serving in this function, Adrian Jäger has decided to retire. Fritz Grossenbacher will take over as the new secretary of the Vet Pharma Code at scienceindustries on 1 July 2017.
 
 
     
Do you want to know more about our points of view, or do you have any questions about them? Follow us on Twitter or contact our specialists at scienceindustries.

sig. Dr. Beat Moser
Director
sig. Marcel Sennhauser
Head of Communications
 
 
      scienceindustries
Business Association Chemistry Pharma Biotech
Nordstrasse 15 - P.O. Box
CH-8021 Zurich
Phone +41 44 368 17 11
Fax +41 44 368 17 70
E-Mail info@scienceindustries.ch
Internet www.scienceindustries.ch
Twitter @swiss_science
 
   
unsubscribe | update profile | forward to a friend ©2017 scienceindustries | Impressum