Farming in Switzerland becomes less attractive

There has been a further reduction in the number of farms in Switzerland, with the figure dropping from 63,600 to 61,800 over the past two years.

The Federal Statistics Office said on Thursday that mostly small farm holdings were affected.

Since 2000, Switzerland has seen a 12 per cent decrease in the total number of farms.

However, the size of the average Swiss farm has increased over the same period. More than one in five holdings has 25 hectares or more whereas the figure was only 16 per cent in 2000.

The average farm now has 17.2 hectares of land compared with 16.8 in 2005.