Switzerland Could Feed Itself, Study Says

Yet anyone who looks more closely will quickly notice: this scenario is not a plea for isolationism, but a calculation exercise with one clear condition.

The lever lies not in more fertiliser or greater intensification, but in a different use of land. Today, arable land in Switzerland is subject to strong competing demands: it either produces food directly for people or it produces feed for animals. And it is precisely this competition that lies at the heart of the study.

The crux: cropland for animal feed or cropland for people?

FiBL researcher Raphaël Charles describes in the SRF report a "well-known observation": livestock farming as well as meat and dairy production consume a great many resources. From this arises the central question of how land can be used primarily to feed people.

This may sound abstract, but it has a very concrete consequence: a significant portion of cultivated land today serves the production of animal feed, for cattle, pigs, or poultry, for example. Were these areas to be converted more extensively to crops that feed directly into human nutrition, Switzerland could, according to the study, feed its population. The price, however, would be lower consumption of meat and dairy products.

What is important is what the study explicitly does not say: it does not fundamentally call into question cattle farming on pastures. In the SRF report, Charles emphasises that Switzerland is a 'land of pastures' and that cattle have their place there. The situation becomes critical where arable land is used to grow feed for animals rather than food for people.

Self-sufficiency: What the figures reveal and what they conceal

In political debate, the 'degree of self-sufficiency' is frequently invoked. Officially, a distinction is drawn between gross and net figures. Net means: a correction is applied for the extent to which Swiss production relies on imported feedstuffs.

The Agricultural Report, for example, shows a gross self-sufficiency rate of 53 percent and a net rate of 46 percent for 2022. This demonstrates that a portion of animal production is indirectly tied to imports, since concentrate feed and protein carriers must be purchased abroad.

How import-dependent the system is with regard to proteins is illustrated by a ZHAW study: approximately 70 percent of the protein in concentrate feed comes from imports, primarily soya. This is precisely where the logic of the new autarky scenario takes hold: if fewer animals are fed on imported protein and arable land produces less feed and more food, the balance shifts.

Direct payments as a systemic signal: Who is being rewarded?

The study thereby touches on a sore point that Charles addresses openly in the SRF report: the current system of direct payments promotes animal production more strongly than plant production.

This is politically explosive, because direct payments not only secure incomes but also send a signal as to what counts as 'desired' production. When policy and market sustain high livestock numbers, consequential questions arise that extend beyond agriculture: more slurry, more nitrogen inputs, more pressure on biodiversity, greater potential for conflict with wildlife and protected areas. The study is thus less a recipe than a mirror: it shows what kind of agriculture we are actually organising through our incentive structures.

What would change? Three shifts that can hurt

1) Fewer animal products, more direct consumption
The central condition is an adjustment of dietary habits: less meat and dairy products, more cereals and legumes. According to the SRF report, the study identifies precisely such shifts as rapidly implementable and at the same time beneficial for the climate and biodiversity.

2) Reprioritizing land use
Not every area is equal. Pastures cannot simply be converted into arable land. That is why the scenario is not an 'all plant-based' model, but rather an 'arable land first for people' model. The question is: what do we use the scarce arable soils of the Mittelland for?

3) Realigning agricultural policy
If direct payments and programmes more strongly reward plant-based food security, soil fertility, biodiversity and genuine resource efficiency, production will shift in the medium term. This would not only be a technical transformation, but a cultural one as well.

The uncomfortable conclusion: autarky is not a law of nature, but a choice

The SRF report makes it clear: the study does not seek to dictate a solution. It provides facts to 'shape the agricultural policy of tomorrow'. That is precisely the real message. 'Could we?' is in this case less a question of yields than a question of priorities.

Because the current system does not simply produce food — it also produces livestock populations, import flows, environmental consequences and political dependencies. When a study now shows that full self-sufficiency would be arithmetically possible, the debate shifts: away from the anxious question 'Will it be enough?' towards the formative question 'What do we use our land, our money and our animals for?'

And perhaps that is the most important insight: food security is not merely a number, but an ethics. One that decides whether agriculture primarily feeds animals or nourishes people.