A round table on the topic of “Budget Incentives and Development of Entrepreneurship in BiH” was held today in Mostar, organised by the Institute for Youth Development KULT and as a part of the “BH Business Site” initiative. Representatives of relevant institutions, of the governmental and non-governmental sector, discussed the financial support to the economy and the effect that the support has in the final, with particular reflection on the development of entrepreneurship in the Federation of BiH. The perspective and the less perspective branches of the economy in BiH were also discussed, as well as the distribution of funds among them.
”The data demonstrated that certain branches of economy that were listed as perspective in the strategic documents of the governmental institutions, remained neglected when it comes to budget, such as the IT sector, tourism, industry of wood, while other branches, which are also advocated to require an even greater support, such as agriculture, were the favourites. But we were not presented with the expected effect in these fields” – pointed out Rusmir Pobri? from the Institute for Youth Development KULT.
The research conducted by the Institute for Youth Development KULT, as a part of the “BH Business Site Initiative”, indicated to a plummet in allocations for economic incentives in 2014 in comparison to 2013. The subject of the research was the manner of allocating funds.
”Most of the institutions stated that they issue public calls and that they have criteria for awarding funds, but the assessment of the effect of funds was either not delivered by a vast number of the institutions or not conducted according to over 100 percent of them, and the funds are extremely significant and owned by tax payers” – says Pobri?. Zdenko Peri? from the Federal Ministry of Development, Entrepreneurship and Crafts agrees that the monitoring of the post-award effect is the greatest problem. ”The aim of awarding incentives of our Ministry is to aid the development of small and medium businesses. In the past 12 years, the form of awarding incentives has changed several times. The problem remained the same. We still do not have a plan of monitoring effects and efficiency of awarded incentives” – added Peri?.
During the round table, there was much discussion over the difficult position of businessmen in the Federation of BiH. Only in the area of Tuzla Canton there are around 11,500 businessmen, however, the incentives they are provided by the Federation and the Canton are small, or miserable, claims Željko Babi?, the President of the Business Chamber of Tuzla Canton.
”Concretely, the procedure of incentive commissions should be changed, the investments into firms that suffer losses should decrease, there should be less investment in Railroads or Mines and greater incentives provided for small businesses that hire one or two employees”, added Babi?.
The ”BH Business Site” initiative is conducted as a part of the Civil Society Sustainability Project (CSSP) that is being realised by the Centres for Civil Initiatives (CCI) and the Centre for Promoting Civil Society (CPCD), which is supported by the US Agency for International Development (USAID) and the Government of the United Kingdom.
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