€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.

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?