Caspian Energy (CE): Your Excellency, which countries are strategic partners of Montenegro? Which big investment projects is Montenegro implementing together with the EU?
Milo Djukanovic, President of Montenegro: At the outset, allow me to thank you for the opportunity to share with your distinguished readers some basic facts about Montenegro. Montenegro is a small, but secure and politically stable country, with an open economy and a good geographical position. Our overall policy is focused on improving the quality of life of citizens and fast economic development. Significant investments, monetary stability, free capital flows, low taxes and rising competitiveness are the main reasons for the high rates of real GDP growth, which in the previous two years amounted to 4.7% and 4.9% respectively. In its latest report, credit rating agency Moody’s confirmed the rating “B1” for Montenegro, changing its outlook from “stable” to “positive”, while in the last report of the World Economic Forum - the Global Competitiveness Index 2017/18, Montenegro improved its position moving up 5 places compared to the previous report. The above facts, first of all, reflect the investors’ trust in the achieved economic progress and a clear economic perspective of Montenegro.
Foreign direct investments have been a very important impetus for the economic growth. Measured per capita and by the share of foreign direct investments in GDP, Montenegro is at the European top. In the period 2008-2018, we attracted over 7.5 billion euros of FDI. Almost 4 billion of this amount comes from the investors from the EU-28 countries. Italy and Austria are leading with 825 and 530 million euros respectively. All European countries (EU-28, Switzerland and Norway) have investments in Montenegro. However, in addition to investors from Europe, in recent years investments from the United Arab Emirates, Turkey and, of course, Azerbaijan are also very significant.
When it comes to concrete projects, with partners from Italy we are finalizing the installation of a submarine power cable that connects the two countries, allowing Montenegro to become the energy hub in the Balkans; we are about to finish the exploration of oil and gas in the part of the Adriatic Sea that belongs to Montenegro; we are completing the construction of the second wind farm and we are about to build the first solar power plant; we are building the first section of the highway; we are developing numerous projects in tourism; we are strengthening the banking and telecommunication sectors, etc.
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