Zurich airport says ‘non’ to French announcements
Switzerland's busiest airport, Zurich, will drop French language tannoy announcements, switching to German and English only.
+ Get the most important news from Switzerland in your inbox
The airport operators said this was due to “a new concept aimed at minimising announcements”.
“We are following an international trend,” Livia Caluori, spokesperson for Zurich airport, told the Keystone-ATS agency today, confirming an article inthe Tages Anzeiger. “Other airports are also reducing announcements to focus on passenger comfort,” she added.
The decision to drop the second Swiss national language was based on an analysis of user data, Caluori continued. Five years ago, the website’s usage data had been examined and it had emerged that only 1% of users had clicked on the French version.
“However, thanks to new technologies, French-speakers are not completely overwhelmed,” the spokeswoman explained. “Almost all Internet browsers offer integrated translators. This means that a website in English or German can be translated into another language with a single click.”
Swissport, the world’s number one airport handling company from Zurich, also confirmed the language changes to Keystone-ATS. From July 2024, ground staff will no longer make announcements in French. The corresponding language requirement for passenger service employees has already been deleted.
This also offers advantages in terms of recruitment, said Nathalie Berchtold, spokesperson for Swissport. Without the French language requirement, the company has access to a larger pool of candidates, a decisive advantage in view of the shortage of skilled labour in Switzerland.
Translated from Italian with DeepL/mga
This news story has been written and carefully fact-checked by an external editorial team. At SWI swissinfo.ch we select the most relevant news for an international audience and use automatic translation tools such as DeepL to translate it into English. Providing you with automatically translated news gives us the time to write more in-depth articles.
If you want to know more about how we work, have a look here, if you want to learn more about how we use technology, click here, and if you have feedback on this news story please write to english@swissinfo.ch.
More
Switzerland turns train tracks into solar power plants
More
Zurich: how the world capital of housing shortages is tackling the problem
More
Swiss defence industry moving abroad to escape neutrality
More
The Böögg, Switzerland’s exploding psychic snowman
More
Switzerland’s housing shortage: how bad is it?
In compliance with the JTI standards
More: SWI swissinfo.ch certified by the Journalism Trust Initiative
You can find an overview of ongoing debates with our journalists here . Please join us!
If you want to start a conversation about a topic raised in this article or want to report factual errors, email us at english@swissinfo.ch.