Liberalization of public procurements in CEFTA countries starting May 2010 - equal terms for all participants in tenders

(Mlađan Dinkić)

The agreement on liberalization of public procurements in the CEFTA countries will be put in effect on May 1st, 2010, which means that all companies from these countries will be offered equal terms for participation in tenders.

According to the current Law on Public Procurements in Serbia, local companies are offered 20% lower price than to all foreign companies, but that rule will cease to exist at the beginning of May 2010 because all companies from the CEFTA countries will be offered equal terms.

- Serbia will take over the presidency of CEFTA Committee next year. In order to improve cooperation with the CEFTA countries, Serbia plans to achieve 4 goals in 2010: liberalization of the service market, liberalization of the public procurements market, improvement of the investment terms, and creation of clusters and associations of related economies – Mlađan Dinkić, the Minister of Economy of Serbia, said at round table "Economic Cooperation on the Territory of Former Yugoslavia - Opportunities and Challenges", organized by Serbian Association of Managers.

In 2008, as Mlađan Dinkić explained, the value of total exchange of goods between Serbia and the countries of former Yugoslavia amounted to 4.4 billion EUR, 2.75 billion EUR of which was the value of the goods exported by Serbia, while Serbia's import was worth about 1.63 billion EUR.

Speaking of overall export, he said that Serbia had exported 37% of goods to the countries of former SFRY, while 50% of goods had been exported to EU without Slovenia.

The volume of Serbia's trade with the countries of former SFRY in 2009 was reduced, which is, according to the words of the Minister of Economy, a consequence of the crisis and general illiquidity of the economy in all countries, as well as the drop in demand.

Speaking of the investments of former Yugoslav republics in Serbia, he said that the most significant investments had been the ones realized by companies "Mercator", "Agrokor", "Gorenje" and "Nexe Group", while the biggest investor from our country was "Telekom Srbija".

In order to increase Serbian investments in the region, the state plans to additionally capitalize the Export Insurance Agency, which should make the appearance of our companies in the third markets much easier. The Government of Serbia plans to set aside money from the budget to directly support some of the strategic projects such as privatization of Port "Bar".

Dinkić announced that the state would provide money to become minority partner in the consortium of Serbian companies that was going to take part in the race for purchase of Port "Bar".

Today's round table gathered large number of managers from Serbia and the region who tried to give answer to the question if Jugosfera (Yugosphere) was the project of the future or utopia.