s Andr paid more thana million francs annually in taxes to the city. However, a number of recent developmentshave put the secretive companies under pressure. The revolution in communicationstechnology at the end of the 20th century has made trading far more transparent. Evensmall farmers can discover the world market price for their crops, and buyers prefer moreand more to contact producers directly. Globalisation has helped this direct trade byscrapping many tariff barriers, and the end of the cold war has lifted the need for secrecyin the trading of strategic goods. Commodity prices have been dropping for several years,compounding the dealers?x2019; problems. Furthermore, where businesses have beenfamily-run over several generations as in the case of Andr, struggling to avoid totalliquidation in 2001 - they often find it difficult to adopt the new management practicesdemanded in changing economic circumstances. Human resourcesIn recent years, Switzerland has also become a centre for the management of humanresources. The world's leading staffing and recruitment agency, Adecco, has itsheadquarters in Lausanne, while a number of companies have moved their personnelmanagement services to Geneva, or use the services of Geneva-based consultancies Thisdevelopment has been favoured by the fact that Switzerland offers a stable socialenvironment, and low tax rates. At the same time, employers from European Unioncountries find the Swiss employment regulations less bureaucratic than those at home,and more employer-friendly, for example as far as the right to dismiss workers isconcerned. TourismTourism is an important source of income. Visitors from abroad spent nearly 13 billionfrancs in Switzerland in 2000, and domestic tourists around 9.7 billion. Figures releasedby the World Trade Organisation in 2000 put Switzerland in 12th place for tourismearnings. The country welcomed 11.4 million visitors in 2000, coming 17th in the worldfor the number ...
