Postponement of realization of 800m USD worth of projected investments in Serbia in 2009

The President of the Foreign Investors Council (FIC), Aleksandar Radosavljević, said that the realization of 700-800m USD worth of foreign investments in Serbia had been postponed.

- According to the data provided by FIC, the investments worth between 700m and 800m USD, of which realization was supposed to take place in 2009, have been postponed – he said for the new issue of “Cord”, the Belgrade’s monthly magazine in English.

Radosavljević said that "that does not mean that the companies gave up investments, but that they only postpone them", and he added that "now is not the most suitable time for investments because the demand has dropped significantly".

According to his words, the Government of Serbia should not increase taxes to fight the crisis, but improve the collecting of taxes.

- The state has not presented the information on the amount of late taxes yet, and I am sure that that amount is not irrelevant. The state should first collect the late taxes, and then consider introduction of new tax obligations – said Radosavljević.

As he explained, the state should not impose additional obligations on the companies that pay their taxes on regular basis, while the companies that do not pay taxes still refuse to settle their obligations.

The President of FIC said that the Government of Serbia would soon have to present thorough information on how the announced tax on mobile phone calls would be applied because the rules that have been applied to the date “will be drastically changed”.

Radosavljević estimated that CEFTA agreement on free trade increased the attractiveness of Serbia as an investment destination because such agreements made the market larger for the companies that operated in Serbia.

- Serbia is still working on development of trade relations, primarily with Belarus, Ukraine and Turkey, and the potential for investments is being improved in that way – said he.

According to Radosavljević, the time of the crisis is the opportunity for stricter and deeper implementation of reforms and completion of the reforms that were introduced in Serbia after year 2000.

FIC gathers over 120 companies that have invested about 14 billion USD in Serbia and have more than 60,000 employees.