Ambassador Jacques Pitteloud, right, met first in Atlanta with David Satcher, former surgeon general, CDC director and director of the Satcher Health Leadership Institute at Morehouse School of Medicine. Consul Genera Peter Zimmerli, left, accompanied him on a variety of meetings around the city. Photo: Swiss Consulate General on Twitter.

To Jacques Pitteloud, debates about the merits of globalization have their place, but the case for Swiss-American trade cooperation is closed.  

“It’s one of this really clear-cut cases of mutually beneficial relationships,” said Mr. Pitteloud, Switzerland’s ambassador to the United States, who visited Atlanta this week with a quick, eclectic itinerary. 

The numbers are there to back up his assertion, especially in the last 25 years, during which the U.S. has become Switzerland’s top trading partner, and Swiss companies have continued not only to pour in funds but also to place job-generating factories into the United States. 

The average salary at Swiss subsidiaries is upward of $100,000 per year, and the country of 9 million people has committed some $350 billion in investment over the last 12 years, Mr. Pitteloud said.  

“We are very present in the American market — more than most people would imagine for a country the size of four blocks in New York,” he joked. “We are the sixth biggest investor in the American economy. We are always between the first and the third biggest investor in R&D in the U.S. It’s incredible if you think about it.”  

Drawing attention to and enhancing these trade links is a core element of the ambassador’s strategy during his tenure, especially when it comes to Georgia and the South. Mr. Pitteloud visited the innovation center at Curiosity Lab in Peachtree Corners and was slated to meet with Jim Irwin, president of real estate developer New City LLC, before heading off to dinner with at the Swiss residence with representatives of the Swiss business community.  

His tour was arranged by the Consulate General of Switzerland and his meetings accompanied by Consul General Peter Zimmerli, who recently headlined a webinar focused on Swiss investment in Georgia. That event showcased recent Swiss successes like Corvaglia and Freshly, with Swiss business boosters indicating that more manufacturing investment may be likely with the introduction of higher “Buy American” thresholds by the U.S. government.  

While Switzerland generally favors free trade over protectionist measures, Mr. Pitteloud said, Swiss firms will practically may be less affected by them since many already produce in the United States. MARTA’s new rail cars, for instance — a contract won by a Swiss company — will be made in Utah.  

“We are creating jobs here, but it’s beneficial to Switzerland,” Mr. Pitteloud said, putting the number of Swiss-created jobs at 500,000 in the United States. “There are so many examples of countries fighting each other on the trade field, and the Swiss-American relationship is the very demonstration that free trade can benefit both sides if done intelligently.”  

All that said, Mr. Pitteloud noted that a correction to globalization may have been warranted, even if he believes that state capitalism and the U.S.-China trade war may be going too far. 

“For the sake of rationalizing and cutting costs, we went so far as producing ridiculous solutions where you import things that are eaten here and produced at the other end of the planet,” he said. “If you take a holistic approach to the economy, including sustainability, you realize this is stupid. This is stupid, and this is not how it should be, so yes it has gone too far. But at the same time look at all the incredible things that we do together,” he said, citing the benefits of innovation and technological collaboration.  

One all-too-pertinent example today? Moderna’s COVID-19 vaccine is produced in Switzerland, in Mr. Pitteloud’s home canton of Valais, under a U.S. patent.  

The ‘Other’ Switzerland

Mr. Pitteloud’s visit to the South actually started in Charleston, S.C., where he helped open an exhibition at College of Charleston’s Halsey Institute of Contemporary Art by Namsa Leuba, a Guinea-born photographer representative of Switzerland’s growing diversity.  

The Africa connection is a poignant one for the ambassador, a former Swiss intelligence official who found himself in Rwanda during the genocide of 1994 and then formed his own organization to track down perpetrators and bring them to justice. He met his wife, Angelique Gakoko PItteloud, through this journey, and later served as ambassador to Kenya, Uganda, Burundi, Somalia and the Seychelles.  

Perhaps too quietly, Switzerland has become increasingly diverse, he said, with 30 percent of its population either foreign-born or the children of immigrants.  

“We know the traditional image of Switzerland is an image of cuckoo clocks, watches, chocolate, banks, gnomes, the beautiful landscapes and whatever, but there is also a Switzerland that has been the land of immigration for the past 250 years,” Mr. Pitteloud said.  

He pointed to his own Italian heritage as evidence that because the Swiss economy grew faster than its population, importing labor has always been necessary.  

He conceded that some pockets of racism and xenophobia exist, which have manifested in high-profile plebescites like the one that banned the construction of minarets in 2009. But he argued that structurally, the Swiss system has been effective at assimilating its new arrivals and helping them gain economic parity with the native-born.  

“Foreigners moving into Switzerland grow up with us. They go to the same schools, the public system is the same for everyone. They have the same health system. We don’t have ghettos like you will see in other parts of Europe, because they’re literally living with us amongst us.”  

He pointed to one key metric:  “Secondos” — those “new Swiss” of the second generation — attend and graduate college at the same rates as those whose families have lived there for much longer.   

Therein lies another intangible strength of the Swiss-U.S. relationship, he said: the shared consciousness of the need to welcome those from abroad. 

“This is a real similar similarity with the U.S. If you look at the Swiss population today, I would say it’s an approximation, but almost every single Swiss has some sort of foreign blood.”  

Mr. Pitteloud’s family has also made an impact outside of the country: An uncle was instrumental in helping set up the medical school at Morehouse College, which made his meeting there Friday with David Satcher, former U.S. surgeon general and CDC director at the time of the first Ebola outbreak in Africa, all the more special.  

“I was totally fascinated at Morehouse by all the efforts invested into two things: equity in healthcare, and … the whole dimension of prevention that is so important, and talking to Dr. Satcher was was just so enlightening.” 

Mr. Pitteloud became Swiss ambassador to the United States in late 2019 and hopes to have at least two more years in the post. He plans to return to Atlanta.  

 

As managing editor of Global Atlanta, Trevor has spent 15+ years reporting on Atlanta’s ties with the world. An avid traveler, he has undertaken trips to 30+ countries to uncover stories on the perils...

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