World Bank granted loan of 400m EUR as budget aid for Serbia

- The World Bank will grant the loan of 400m USD to Serbia to help its budget - Mlađan Dinkić, the Deputy Prime Minister and the Minister of Economy of Serbia, announced yesterday (October 5, 2009) in Istanbul.

According to the announcement of the Ministry of Economy, Dinkić spoke to Fhilippe Le Houreou, the Vice President of the World Bank for Europe and Central Asia, about support to the budget of Serbia and financing of projects on Corridor 10.

Dinkić said that 200m USD would be granted to Serbia on November 17th at the meeting of the Board of Directors of the World Bank, while another 200m USD would be intended for support to the budget in 2010.

He also reminded that the World Bank had approved the loan of 388m USD for construction of Corridor 10 in Serbia.

- We expect the tender to be finished by the end of this month, and that is when the contractor for the works on the bypass around Dimitrovgrad will be selected. According to the plan of the Government of Serbia, complete Corridor 10 should be finished prior to spring 2012, including the highway between Horgoš and Dimitrovgrad - Dinkić specified.

The Deputy Prime Minister of Serbia, who is staying in Istanbul where he is going to participate in the annual meeting of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund on October 6 and 7, spoke today at round table "Return to Business".

Dinkić was the only representative of the countries of central and east Europe at that meeting, which gathered the ministers of the countries that are successfully dealing with the global economic crisis.

Serbian model of the subsidized loans program, through which about 1 billion EUR have already been granted, was estimated as original and one of the most successful models.

In the presence of 450 delegates from 186 countries, Dinkić said that he expected capital to be moved from developed countries to Serbia because of attractive business environment and the free trade contract.

Dinkić also said that he expected large investments in Serbia's automotive industry, as well as in telecommunications and information technologies.