April 1 (SeeNews) - Serbia's Business Registers Agency and the Central Register of North Macedonia have created the Business and Financial Data Exchange (BIFIDEX), a Western Balkans online registration portal, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) said.
The portal will serve as a one-stop information point for businesses and investors, providing up-to-date information from national business registry agencies and more Western Balkans countries are expected to join it, the bank said in a statement on Friday.
The database currently includes over 500,000 companies and provides information about company ownership, governance, financial reports and organisational changes, allowing interested parties to search for companies active in a specific sector, a geographical location or other predefined criteria.
"We are pleased with the regional dimension of the project and we work towards including other business registries from the region as they get ‘data-ready’. This is very much in line with the ’connectivity agenda’ for the Western Balkans which we are pursuing with our partners," the EBRD Regional Director for Western Balkans and Head for Serbia, Zsuzsanna Hargitai, said in the statement.
The portal is a direct result of the EBRD Investment Climate and Governance Initiative, which aims to improve the business environment in the Western Balkans and other regions where the bank operates. Improving access to up-to-date and trustworthy information and increasing transparency will encourage greater confidence in the local markets, the EBRD said.
The EBRD has been supporting the development of the Western Balkans Regional Business Registry portal and will continue to support the expansion of the initiative and integration of other Western Balkan business registries into the BIFIDEX, it said.