Page 14 - bne IntelliNews newspaper 14 July 2017

Southeast Europe
July 14, 2017 www.intellinews.com I Page 14
Six Western Balkans leaders endorse plan on regional economic area
Valentina Dimitrievska in Skopje and Clare Nuttall in Bucharest
The leaders of the six Western Balkans countries approved a multi-annual action plan (MAP) for a regional economic area in the Western Balkans at a summit in the Italian city of Trieste on July 12. The six leaders also signed a treaty to integrate their transport networks.
The plan envisages greater trade integration and mobility across the region, but it falls short of the common market discussed by regional leaders at an earlier summit in Sarajevo in March, and there was no mention of a regional customs union in the post-summit announcements.
Instead, the MAP envisages measures that will help the private sector to place products on a market of some 20mn people — comprising the six Western Balkans states Albania, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Kosovo, Macedonia, Montenegro and Serbia — and the acceptance of a regional model of development.
Adoption of the MAP comes as trade within the region, which includes five countries that used to be part of a single state — Yugoslavia — has dwin- dled, EU Enlargement Commissioner Johannes Hahn pointed out.
The Western Balkans regional economic area “will create a welcoming business environment, stimu- late entrepreneurship, build a knowledge-based so- ciety, provide good quality jobs, and ensure competi- tive markets. I believe it has the power to transform,” Hahn told businesspeople in Trieste on July 12.
EU and Western Balkans leaders at the Western Balkans summit in Trieste.
However, he added that while trade between the Western Balkans and the EU has more than dou- bled in the last decade to reach €44bn in 2016,
“By contrast, trade within the region has stagnated”.
“There is a great untapped economic potential here, including your possibilities to create value chains with your neighbours who are close eco- nomically and physically. One of the main objec- tives of the Regional Economic Area is to remove those barriers that still exits to trade, business and investment between your countries,” Hahn said.
“Individually, each actioned market is small. To- gether you represent almost 20mn people. With reform-oriented governments in office across the region we are at exactly the right time for a more business-driven approach. This is the regional economic approach for the Western Balkans, building on the ‘Berlin process’.”
The signing of the MAP was also welcomed by the Regional Cooperation Council (RCC), which pro- motes regional cooperation and the European and Euro-Atlantic integration of Southeast Europe.
“This will provide important impetus to the EU accession paths based on individual merits, speed up full compliance with the Copenhagen economic criteria and unleash greater economic potentials,” the RCC said in a statement.
“The MAP has been created to enable unob- structed flow of goods, services, capital and highly