Although state officials are vehemently denying claims that the state discriminates against domestic small investors, the situation in reality seems different. Pavle Medić explains that direct support in the form of subsidies and indirect support through tax laws benefit only large companies.
„The main obstacles to export growth in the SME sector lie in underinvestment and labor shortages, and the key problem is the investment environment,“ says CEVES Director Nemanja Šormaz in an interview with Biznis.rs.
Pavle Medić and Lazar Ivanović write for NIN about the plan „Jump into the Future – Serbia Expo 2027„. “This idea, which we will call the “plan' for the purpose of this text, although we have never seen it, is yet another in a series of marketing tricks without adequate basis in law and reality. For this very reason, we will criticize it from an institutional perspective, as well as from the viewpoint of its economic expediency."
After several months of hibernation, the play about the lithium miracle has started again in the theatre of the absurd. Two facts. First: Serbia is a country with one of the highest rates of corruption on the European continent – only BiH, Belarus, and Ukraine are worse. Second: the Jadar project is a major challenge for Serbia.
SME investments in Serbia are drastically lower compared to the EU average, says Pavle Medić, an economist at CEVES, in an interview with Bloomberg Adria Serbia, adding that SMEs invest only 5% of GDP compared to 10% in the EU.
The essence of the message we want to convey at our MSP100 EXPO event is that small and medium-sized enterprises develop best if people develop, and people develop with the development of SMEs if the education system works for them, not for providing jobs to people with outdated profiles.
The SME sector, as well as its champions, do not enjoy a sufficiently stimulating and equitable business environment in their home country.
The total index score of 40.1 (out of 100 points) indicates that SMEs are at a lower-middle level of development, which corresponds to Serbia's level of development compared to EU countries.
To support the further strong development of the SME sector, highlight the challenges it faces, and propose appropriate institutional solutions, CEVES launched the MSP100 initiative, within which the MSP100 Expo: People are Success conference was held at the Science and Technology Park Niš.
The Center for Advanced Economic Studies and the Science and Technology Park Niš are organizing the second event on November 9, 2023, in Niš.
Although local self-government units in Serbia had adopted local strategic documents even before the new Law on the Planning System came into force, this did not mean that local development was managed systematically in Serbia.
The working group, which brings together about twenty economic experts, agreed that fiscal policy, primarily a real reduction in state spending, had only a mildly contractionary effect on economic growth, and that unjustified extraordinary expenditures included in the budget rebalance would do little to help economic growth, and would slow down the necessary inflation containment, even though a lower deficit was projected compared to the previous year.
According to the EU Economic Sentiment Indicator measurements, economic sentiment in Serbia is slightly improving compared to the beginning of 2023. As of
Although appealing to dissatisfied consumers, the theory of price increases due to the greed of sellers and producers, i.e., the pursuit of maximum profit („greedflation“)
The state and retailers have reached an agreement to lower prices for 20 products starting from the middle of this week, and Pavle Medi, an economist at CEVES, tells Bloomberg Adria that the agreement has no potential to curb inflationary expectations.
Green transition and digital transformation occupy the highest places in companies' business plans and in the development agendas of countries around the world. More
Serbia's economic growth during 2022 was almost half as slow (2.3%) compared to Western Balkan countries (4.1%), significantly slower
„The main causes of low private investment concern three things – the first is the now well-known story about the unfavorable business environment. The second factor is also known, and that is the almost exclusive focus of the state on attracting foreign direct investment. The third factor is a weak, relatively weak, and, we must say, outdated way of managing companies,“ said Lazar Ivanović, an economist at CEVES, to Bloomberg Adria.
At the beginning of the transition, private capital generated just over 20 percent of GDP, and today remaining state-owned enterprises generate less than 10 percent of GDP, but still significantly influence the business environment and hinder the faster growth of domestic small and medium-sized enterprises.
A conference was held in Niš Improving Local Economic Development Planning through Inter-municipal Cooperation, organized by the Center for High Economic Studies CEVES together with the Regional Development Agency South. This is the first of the planned three events of the Platform „Sustainable Development for All,“ which aims to encourage the exchange of knowledge and experiences of municipalities and cities across Serbia regarding the localization of sustainable development goals and their integration into local planning documents.
