ROME: Kosovo has a stable growth forecast at 4% this year, tax breaks and several sectors in which to invest, including infrastructure, transport, construction, renewable energy, minerals, food industry, computers, tourism, telecommunications, textile, wood and leather, according to a presentation for 70 Italian firms attending an economic forum in Rome dedicated to the Balkan country. The forum was organized Tuesday by the Italian Institute for Foreign Trade (ICE) and Kosovo’s agency for the promotion of investments, Kiesa.
Pristina’s government, said Premier Isa Mustafa, ”has promoted several reforms to favor investments from Italy through which we want to boost relations in the fields of production and trade”. Relations with Rome are solid ”but not satisfying yet”, said Finance Minister Havdullah Hoti, who together with Trade and Industry Minister Hykmete Bajrami and parliament speaker, Kadri Veseli, is accompanying the institutional and entrepreneurial delegation from Pristina.
The objective, explained the head of the Kosovan executive, ”is to develop cooperation with Italy in the sectors of production and trade to boost Italian investments”. Many steps over the past few years have been taken to encourage foreign investments, the premier said, thanks to the government’s reforms: ”The growth rate, forecast at 4% in 2017, is stable, but we need to strengthen this growth”. The number of foreign entrepreneurs is increasing, also thanks to better tax policies.
Unemployment remains a problem, especially for the young, and is ”structural”, admitted Mustafa, along with the issue of electrical power provision. But he assured that ”we are close to the conclusion of new agreements for the development of a new hydroelectric plant that will be made by a US investor, an investment worth one billion euros whose construction will begin in the second half of the year”.
Mustafa also said the government has worked on infrastructure. ”With the completion of the highway connecting the country to Albania that enables a connection with the sea, the construction of the section that will reach Skopje and the completion of the part that will connect Kosovo to Serbia with the last 22 km left”, the transport system will be given a strong impulse.
Kosovo also has many resources, the real treasure ”are young workers, who are well trained”, said Minister Bajrami, in a country where 43% of the population is under 24. In spite of these developments, the country still has a bad reputation but 17 years after the end of the war, Pristina’s government guarantees, the economy is stable and the country is looking forward.
