Bosnian exports rebounding

For the first time since they started dropping in January 2009 (yoy), exports have rebounded and grown for two consecutive months in January and February.

Jan-Feb exports were up 17% (yoy), but they are still 9% below where they were during the same months in 2008. By industrial groupings, export growth was strongest in the energy sector (33%), intermediate goods (32%) and durable consumer goods (22%). On the other hand, exports of capital and non-durable consumer goods were down 16% and 2% respectively. Export growth is observed across all traditional BH industries: electric power, steel, aluminum, furniture, as well as primary agricultural products.

Imports continued dropping, reflecting tight credit and indicating still weak investment. Jan-Feb imports dropped 6% (yoy) and they were 28% lower than during the same months in 2008.

€25 million investment in Sarajevo International Airport upgrade to meet growing traffic

The EBRD is supporting the modernisation of Sarajevo International Airport with a €25 million loan to expand the airport's infrastructure and help it address capacity constraints. The loan is extended directly to Sarajevo International Airport and is guaranteed by the state of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Sarajevo International Airport is the main gateway to Bosnia and Herzegovina, handling the majority of the international traffic flow. In recent years passenger traffic at the airport has increased significantly and continues to grow.

The EBRD loan will be used to finance the expansion of the passenger terminal, to build a new rapid runway and to expand the aircraft parking apron. The project will add close to 7,000 square meters to the current area of the passenger terminal of 10,000 square meters.

The expansion is supported by grant financing from the Dutch government, the Western Balkans Fund and EBRD Shareholder Special Fund of nearly €1 million. The grants will be used for tasks including preparation of the final design of the expanded passenger terminal and updating the corporate plan outlining the airport's future strategy.

The project will support greater commercialisation of the airport's activities and will facilitate implementation of the EU's Single European Sky initiative in Bosnia and Herzegovina, which involves gradual liberalisation of air traffic.

"We are pleased to support the expansion of the main airport in Bosnia and Herzegovina at a time when investment sources remain scarce. The upgrade of Sarajevo International Airport will improve the quality of air traffic movement stimulating further growth in passenger flow," said Sue Barrett, Director of the EBRD Transport Team.

Dragan Vrankic, Minister of Finance and Treasury of Bosnia and Herzegovina, added: "I am glad that this project relies primarily on the creditworthiness of the company for repayment of the loan. The project will also help us to test the new legal structure for financing of public utilities whereby, through direct loan agreement with international financial institutions, the utilities assume much more accountability and responsibility for all aspects of project implementation."

"This project is a result of the long-standing co-operation between the EBRD and Sarajevo International Airport. In addition to solving the airport's needs in light of the future growth, the expanded terminal building will provide much higher quality of services to the passengers, while improving the image of the country by offering it a modern gateway", said Bakir Karahasanovic, General Manager of Sarajevo International Airport.

Since the beginning of its activities in Bosnia and Herzegovina, the EBRD has committed over €1 billion to the country's economy, of which over a third has been in the infrastructure sector.

Bloggers given unparalleled access to the forthcoming Malaysia Global Business Forum - Bosnia

The bloggers will be given unparalleled access to the forthcoming Malaysia Global Business Forum - Bosnia, for the first time in Malaysia.

The keynote speaker, Tun Dr. Mahathir Mohamad (Malaysia's former Prime Minister) is an avid blogger himself and will be the keynote speaker during the forum. Dr. Haris Silajdzic, President of Bosnia-Herzegovina has also confirmed his presence and will lead the Bosnian delegation to the Malaysia Global Business Forum, scheduled 8 – 11 November, 2009 at Borneo Convention Centre in Kuching, Sarawak (one of Malaysia's states located in Borneo).

Tun Dr. Mahathir Mohamad will be delivering the keynote address with other speakers include:

Amer Bukvic – CEO Bank Bosnia International – who is recognised as Europe’s leading Islamic banker
Amer Jeralgic – CEO of Elektrpravada, Bosnia’s largest and most profitable company which is equivalent to TNB and is involved in the energy and mining sector
Sam Osmanagic – Discoverer of the Bosnian Valley of the Pyramids and Bosnia’s Indiana Jones
Tarik Dodic – Secretary General of Foreign Trade Chamber Bosnia who is leading a strong delegation of Bosnian business leaders

The forum will be focusing on various sectors such as Higher Education, energy and power, biotech, agro-tech, Halal, Islamic Banking, tourism, and more.

As for the bloggers who wish to attend and cover the event, will have the following access:

• Dedicated stage for bloggers to blog from during the main session
• Access to all press conferences
• Access to VIP speakers
• Access to break out sessions for industry specific sessions
• Broadband access to upload live
• Pre and post-event access

To register as a blogger, or for more details, please send your contact details and blog site to either azizul@asiaprc.com or diyana@asiaprc.com

Presentation of the Bosnian auto cluster in Duisburg, Germany

Recently the Organization of Industrial and Economic Chamber (IHK) of Duisburg, organized a workshop on the topic of “(Still) Undiscovered Markets in Souteast Europe”.


The emphasis, was placed at the automobile industry in Southeast Europe. Representatives of German commercial branch offices in Bosnia presented macroeconomic state in the country while representatives of Bosnian Auto cluster pointed to the potentials of these state in the accompanying automobile industry. Although global crisis in Germany still causes certain worries - the predicted economic growth for this year should be -5.0%, the interest for this region was still very good.


It should be emphasized that representative of Autocluster BiH and coordinator of Network Autoclusters SEE, in which clusters from Slovenia, Croatia, Serbia, Macedonia and Bosnia are included, had a very positive meeting with a representative of newly formed NEW (North Rhine and Westphalia). This cluster is developed on similar basis as Network of Autoclusters SEE, because it encompasses 8 independent and functioning automobile clusters from this German province. The meeting has shown that there are similarities in concept of development and enough meeting points for future possible joint activities.

Prime Minister lectures in Vienna on topic "Bosnia – Chances in the Economic Crisis"

Vienna, May 19 – PM Nedzad Brankovic, on invitation of the Political Academy of Austrian National Party, Institute for the area of Danube and Central Europe (IDM) and World Public Forum “Dialogue of Civilizations” held a lecture yesterday at the Eschenbach Palace in Vienna on the topic “Bosnia – Chances in the Economic Crisis”.

Bosnian MIMS-group joins Clinton Global Initiative

Representatives of the MIMS-group attended closed preparatory working meeting with directors of companies that are members of Clinton Global Initiative, in Washington. MIMS-group recently become a member of this prestigious organization as the first Bosnian enterprise to do so.


The meeting was chaired by President Bill Clinton and moderated by Mr. Kemal Dervish, until recently director of the UNDP and current Vice-President of the Brookings Institute. Among others the meeting was attended by Mr. Muhtar Kent the CEO of Coca-Cola and Patricia Voertz, the CEO of Archer Daniels Midland, the largest company in the world in the field of Agriculture.

Japanese interest in highway construction in Bosnia

On the margins of the annual meeting of the Board of Governors of European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), held in London, Bosnian Foreign Minister Sven Alkalaj met with the Head of the Delegation of the Japanese Agency for International Cooperation (JICA) Mr. Hiroto Arakawa.


Minister Alkalaj and Mr. Arakawa exchanged opinions on current and future cooperation of Bosnia and Herzegovina and the Government of Japan.


Arakawa has expressed a special interest of Japan to participate in the grand project of highway construction through Bosnia on the international Corridor 5C, and with this in mind, agreed that concrete cooperation in this project should be agreed upon by the Embassy of Japan in Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Intensifying economic cooperation between Bosnia and Jordan

Bosnian Presidency member Željko Komšić and Jordanian King Abdulah II met in Amman and agreed that, in addition to the excellent cooperation on the political level and exceptional friendly relations, the two countries need to intensify economic cooperation between for which there are great opportunities in all economic areas.


King Abdulah II confirmed the return visit of the Jordanian Royal Couple to Bosnia during August.


The press release states that Komšić participated in the work of two-day Summit of the World Economic Forum in Amman and the session "The Union for the Mediterranean", where new possibilities and modalities of cooperation between Mediterranean countries were discussed.

Coal mines generate losses

As I wrote before coal mines and coal plants are a big headache for Bosnian economy. Despite those facts Bosnian political decision makers continue to pump tax payers money into those economically and environmentally devastating fields.

Recently published facts show that eight mines (Kreka, Banovići, Đurđevik, Kakanj, Breza, Zenica, Bila i Gračanica) are 11,1 million KM (ca 5.5 million €) in minus.

At the same time those mines haven't payed health insurance and retirement fees for 12.600 miners to an equivalent of 170 million KM (85 million €). They owe their suppliers 48 million KM (24 million €) while 123 million KM (61,5 million €) of taxes are yet to be paid.

The combined loss of those eight mines reaches 352,1 million KM (176,05 million €) which clearly speaks for closure of those coal mines and investment of all that tax payer's money into something more lucrative, such as alternative energy, road and rail-road infrastructure or educational programs for all those unemployed who can't get any work due to lack of vocational training or poor education.

Opportunities in oil business in Bosnia

Recently there have been several reports of possible oil findings in Bosnia. Few days ago Bosnian newspaper published an article of unnamed British-Canadian company presenting a letter of intent to the Bosnian government regarding oil exploration. They supposedly claimed possible proceeds of 80 billion dollars over the next 30 years.

Before that, Dean of the Faculty of Technology and Mining in the northern Bosnian town of Tuzla, Abdulah Basic, was quoted by some Bosnian media outlets claiming that some 500 million tonnes of oil could be located in several locations in the northern Bosnia as well as further in the southern Bosnia in a the depth of between 4,000 and 6,000 metres.

According to several Bosnian experts, British Petroleum (BP) and American Oil Company, AMOCO, now also part of BP, were interested in potential oil resources in Bosnia before the 1992-1995 Serbian, Montenegrin and Croatian aggressions against Bosnia.

In cooperation with these two companies, one of the biggest Bosnian construction companies, Energoinvest, carried out a research which proved the existence of oil pools in the northern region of Posavina, as well as in several locations in the south.

Basic says that Energoinvest still has the original report which indicates that Bosnia may have oil resources as big as Saudi Arabia or Iraq.

Do you have an opinion or additional info regarding this matter? Should Bosnia let private investors run this operation or form it's own state-owned company?

Taking it to the street...

Bosnia, a country of wast opportunities just waiting to be explored.

Idea with this blog is to be a meeting point of all of those who in any way are interested in doing business in Bosnia. Exchange of experiences, info-sharing or connecting with presumptive partners are some of those things that I hope to facilitate here.

Whether you are planning multi-million green-filed investment, looking for ways to export your products or are a student scanning the opportunities in Bosnia I hope you will find some useful info here.

From time to time I will post info I find interesting but I also invite you, my respected reader, to contribute with your own thoughts, ideas and comments.

I hope that you will find the time spent here well invested.