BELGRADE (Serbia), February 24 (SeeNews) – An International Monetary Fund (IMF) mission has started a visit to Serbia to discuss fiscal, monetary and macroeconomic developments, the country's central bank said on Monday.
The IMF mission led by the head of the IMF's Serbia team Jan Kees Martijn will also discuss the economic projections of the country for the coming period, the central bank said in a statement.
"With economic growth of 4.2%, in our latest estimate, Serbia is one of the few countries whose growth in 2019 outperformed all the projections released in the course of the year. Besides, Serbia’s GDP growth came in at 6.1% in Q4, providing the largest contribution to the growth of the Western Balkans region, which only goes to show that the policy pursued in Serbia is adequate," central bank governor Jorgovanka Tabakovic said during a meeting with Martijn.
With gross foreign direct investment (FDI) of 3.8 billion euro ($4.1 billion), Serbia attracted around 55% of all FDI to the Western Balkans in the last two years, Tabakovic said.
"It is critical that we maintain stability, continue with the policies that yield good results and advance reforms in all key areas," she noted.
The IMF staff visit is an introduction to the next, fourth semi-annual review of the implementation of Serbia’s economic programme supported by the Policy Coordination Instrument (PCI). The previous review was concluded on December 19.
In July 2018, the IMF approved a 30-month PCI with Serbia which includes reforms of the tax administration to help increase the efficiency of revenue collection and improve the business climate.
($ = 0.924526 euro)