“No one invests where security scans”, connoisseurs raise alarm: The North is damaging the economy

Economy expert Mustaf Kadriaj says of last month's tensions in the four Serb majority municipalities in northern Kosovo have caused the country to lose potential foreign investment.

Professor Kadriaj urges the government to be attentive and to respond to the international community for extending the situation to the north, in order to create credibility, where this will reflect on foreign investors.

According to him, no investor wants to invest in a country where there is no security for their capital.

No investor wants to invest in a country where there is no security to invest its capital. Before I see the share of taxes, legal and technical infrastructure, it is security, because it is a prerequisite for a foreign investor to invest in Kosovo. In this direction, the government has to call on the mind to sit at the negotiating table and create reports like it was with the international community and friends, and create a kind of credibility that we can return to the table again, and in a way this will reflect on the foreign investors. Because, with this kind of political stalemate in the international arena, for now Kosovo has more of a problem with international friends than with Serbia itself, so in this respect, the government must reflect on creating a precondition for foreign investors not to see Kosovo as a country where there is conflict and security crisis, but a country where it can become business”, Kadriaj says.

Even former head of the Kosovo Economic Ode (OEK), Safet Gerjaliu estimates that political stability is essential for economic development in the country, but that, according to him, is lacking in the country.

Gerjaliu says the biggest concern is that the situation in the north is damaging Kosovo's image.

The recent political agenda in Kosovo is damaging Kosovo in many ways. In this direction where political agendas dominate this form there is no room for economic development. Therefore, the greatest concern is not only in the internal process that is hurting existing businesses, but also damaging Kosovo's image. No one will come to invest in a country where there is no political stability, in a country where borders are closed for either raw materials or final products, all of this is damaging Kosovo every day and then”, Gerjaliu says.

The economy's recogniser, Nagip Svileri, also draws attention that the political situation harms Kosovo economically, resulting in foreign investment.

If this situation of uncertainty continues, of course it leads to the harm of foreign direct investments to come to invest their capital in Kosovo. This inevitable leads to an economic downturn. In this context, every foreign investor, before investing capital in any particular country, first see the security of their capital as well as the” market, says Svilier.

Skyer estimates that Kosovo does not offer favourable conditions for attracting foreign investors. So the country continues to chat in attracting foreign direct investments, as it did not bring in any major strategic investors in recent years.

It has been more than three years since Kosovo has no law on strategic investments. Meanwhile, the draft stable investment adopted in January of this year by the government has not yet been considered in principle in the Kosovo Assembly.

Kosovo remains with the most negative trend of foreign investment compared to the countries of the region, such as Serbia, Northern Macedonia and Albania.