Minister Kavarić participates in Fifth EU-Southeast Europe Summit

Vienna, Austria (5 October 2016) -- The Western Balkans countries have become aware of the importance of regional cooperation and integration as a whole through a process of convergence with the European Union, and our growth opportunities lie in foreign direct investments and joint regional projects in infrastructure, Minister of Economy Vladimir Kavarić stated.

Minister of Economy Vladimir Kavarić participated today in the Fifth EU-Southeast Europe Summit, entitled „Exploring Paths to Prosperity“ in Vienna. Within the aforementioned topic, he was speaking at a panel „Europe: On the Edge“, on the following topics: „Dealing with the migrant crisis“, „After Brexit: What lies in store for the EU?“ and „EU and the Balkans: should further integration be expected?“.

As an example of a successful project not only of regional but also European scale, he referred to an undersea cable between Montenegro and Italy, which will be a sort of an energy bridge between the European Union and the Balkan countries, and thus position Montenegro as an important energy hub.

„With the strengthening of distribution capacities in the region, with the construction of the undersea cable, all national and regional projects in the energy field are additionally gaining in importance, both in the context of the production and in the context of the electricity transport to the EU,“ Minister Kavarić said.

He recalled that Montenegro initiated and that the EU supported the creation of regional hydrological maps of the Western Balkans, which should be the most important project for the region, as he said.

According to him, these projects demonstrate the importance of cooperation in the Western Balkans, which is even more significant in the context of EU accession.

„We want to use the process of EU accession, first and foremost, to create a competitive economy, to harmonize the laws with the EU Acquis and to attract new investments. In such an environment, every country, every region of the world is competing in attracting new investments,“ Minister Kavarić noted.

The countries in the region should consider each other in such circumstances as partners in the global market and not as competition at the regional level, he said.

„In order to be more competitive, all the countries in the region need to be open, to improve business regulations and infrastructure, thus increasing the availability of our economies,“ Minister Kavarić said. He recalled that, when it comes to general business environment, Montenegro has an efficient, transparent and competitive tax system, reformed banking system, equal treatment for foreign and domestic investors, Euro as its official currency and liberalized foreign trade system.

„The investment community is made up of investors who are coming from more than 90 countries. Accordingly, foreign direct investments inflow is nearly 20% of GDP in the last 10 years,“ Minister Kavarić said.

Besides Minister Kavarić, Summit in Vienna was attended also by a delegation of the Chamber of Economy of Montenegro, led by its President Velimir Mijušković.

The Fifth EU-Southeast Europe Summit is organised by the renowned publishing house The Economist. The Summit brought together leading decision-makers from the world of politics in the countries of Southeast Europe, but also many entrepreneurs, managers and experts from the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) and the European Investment Bank (EIB), academics, analysts, representatives of central banks, researchers and many more.

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