Geneva - A survey of Swiss companies showed Tuesday that the machinery, electrical engineering and metals industries all expect hard times bought on by the global economic downturn to continue into the third quarter.

Food manufacturers and the construction industry showed the best performance of the 750 industrial and service businesses surveyed by the UBS AG.

Industrial companies polled said they foresee no improvements in the third quarter, but also no deterioration in business activity from the rough second quarter.

The second quarter of the year saw new orders, sales, earnings and production all lose ground in year-on-year comparisons. The labour market also saw an accelerated rate of layoffs.

Overall, the services industry also did not expect a rebound in the third quarter.

Switzerland is officially in recession and UBS expects real GDP to shrink by 2.8 per cent this year. (dpa)