Serbia’s free trade agreement with the United Kingdom, which entered into force, is practically the same as the agreement we have with the European Union and allows free trade for the vast majority of products, said the director of the Sector for Strategic Analysis, Services and Internationalization of the Serbian Chamber of Commerce, Mihailo Vesovic.
In a statement for Tanjug, he stated that what is specific in this agreement in relation to the one with the EU, is that quotas for the export of certain agricultural products have been defined with United Kingdom.
Customs tariffs and nomenclature have also been harmonized, about which interested businessmen can get information through the links published by the Chamber of Commerce as soon as the agreement entered into force.
Vesovic adds that Serbia has had a delay in the application of free trade with United Kingdom since January this year due to the introduced customs duties, which have burdened them somewhat, primarily exporters for the British market, but also importers from that country.
In addition, the data for the first three months show that the decline in total foreign trade was small and exports from Serbia, even in conditions burdened with customs duties, increased by eight percent.
“This is proof that the products that go from Serbia to United Kingdom are primarily competitive, of high quality, so they were able to preserve their market position,” Vesovic estimates.
He adds that all products, primarily agricultural, did not go so well, but as a very positive he states that a large part of Serbian companies did not lose much time or clients, which gives reason to believe that the chance that the agreement with United Kingdom will be used.
Explaining why the British market is important, he says that it is one of the most developed markets, which is very demanding, high quality, highly paid.
It is interesting that with one such market, Serbia has a surplus in trade, and according to Vesovic, it is a consequence of investments.
“It is primarily about the automobile industry, because the largest part of exports is represented by auto parts, ie conductors for the automobile industry, tires. Agricultural products follow, where raspberries are in the first place,” states Vesovic.
He also points to another reason, and that is that Serbia achieved even better results in the export of services than in the exchange of goods.
“It is very important for us, given that this is an extremely competitive sector and that the United Kingdom is known as a major importer and exporter of services,” explains Vesovic.
Vesovic also points out that with the entry into force of the agreement, our businessmen can enter the British market with even more competitive prices, but also that the Serbian market is open to British companies and British investments, which amounted to more than 100 million euros last crisis year.
When asked how much this agreement can mean to raspberries and farmers in general, he stated that this year’s agricultural products are extremely well listed on the stock exchanges, perhaps the best in the last ten years.
That, he says, is a good signal for the Serbian economy because it is obvious that EU countries, including United Kingdom, have started to make larger stocks of products.
“Due to the experience from last year’s crisis, the demand for food is higher, which should be good news for our agriculture, and as he points out, it is expected that United Kingdom will be a big future buyer of agricultural products,” Kurir reports.
