Olympic Games: no benefit to the national economy

Economy — Dec 01, 2010
alpMedia

Switzerland is once again discussing its candidacy for the 2022 Winter Olympics. Environmental organisations are warning against the ecological and economic repercussions. Even Marco Blatter, former CEO of Swiss Olympic, has been quoted on Swiss radio, saying that he was glad the 2006 Games were not held in the Valais. He added that in Turin/I the Games had grown out of all proportion. "With all the infrastructure investments Turin cost around CHF 4.5 bn; Vancouver is costing around CHF 6 bn; and Sochi 2014 is officially budgeting for CHF 13 bn," reports Switzerland's SonntagsZeitung.

And as CIPRA illustrated in AlpsInsight the sports facilities continue to cost lots of money even once the Games are over. In addition there has been no sign of the powerful growth surge that Turin had anticipated. The SonntagsZeitung also writes that Switzerland's Sports Minister Ueli Maurer noted that no direct benefit to the national economy was to be expected from the Olympics.
Sources and additional information: www.umwelt-graubuenden.ch/olympiaden.html (de), www.drs1.ch/www/de/drs1/sendungen/top/de (de), www.cipra.org/de/alpmedia/publikationen/4542 (de/fr/it/sl), SonntagsZeitung 21. November 2010, www.nolympia.de (de)