Prostitution may be, as the saying goes, the world's oldest profession, but it has changed enormously in recent decades.
While the appearance of erotic advertisements in newspapers has given access to this activity to many occasional prostitutes who wouldn't have dared to take to the streets, the appearance of Internet sites dedicated to the activity has further accelerated the phenomenon.
Another major development in the world of prostitution has been population migration. While the market was well occupied by girls from Thailand and other South-East Asian countries in the 90s, the free movement of workers in Europe has profoundly changed the market, as you will see.
To give you an overview of the market, we've compiled data from the biggest erotic sites in Switzerland (German-speaking and French-speaking). We've used the data provided by Switzerland's biggest providers and haven't attempted to weight them. Our figures therefore give an overview of the girls present on the websites, but do not take into account street prostitutes, and with 53% of ads without country information, our figures are by nature not completely representative.
It's a safe bet that among the 53% of ads without country information, many girls come from countries that aren't the best sellers (Hungary, Romania or other Eastern European countries), and that a few Romanian girls qualify as Italian.
Nonetheless, these values remain interesting and reflect a reality.
Our figures show that 54% of the girls present on the Swiss market come from Eastern Europe, including the countries of former Yugoslavia. 30% come from European countries that have not been placed in Eastern Europe, with a high proportion of Spanish girls. South and Central America and all the Caribbean islands account for just 13%, while the rest of the ads, including Asia, Africa and the Middle East, represent just 3%. 
Below are the 8 countries of origin most frequently advertised in erotic ads, with percentage values. We can see that, according to the advertisers, 21% of the girls are of Hungarian origin and 3% come from Switzerland.
These figures are sure to dispel many preconceived ideas about the origins of prostitutes working in Switzerland.
