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The Government of the Republic of Serbia

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Loan agreement with EBRD worth €80m signed

Belgrade, 16 June 2023

Prime Minister Ana Brnabic and Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance Sinisa Mali signed today a loan agreement with the EBRD, which concerns the improvement of scientific infrastructure in Serbia, the construction of new science and technology parks and additional buildings in already existing science and technology parks in the country.

The loan agreement was signed by Mali and Director for the Western Balkans region and Head of Serbia for the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) Matteo Colangeli, while the project agreement was signed by Brnabic, Colangeli and the directors of the science and technology parks in Nis, Cacak and Krusevac – Milan Randjelovic, Mirko Pesic and Martina Manojlovic.

The contract provides €80 million, of which €70 million is intended for the additional construction of science and technology parks, while €10 million is allocated for the BIO 4 campus in Belgrade.

On that occasion, Brnabic pointed out that, when it comes to the science and technology parks in Cacak and Nis, it is about phase two, that is, the construction of other buildings, while in Krusevac, a new, first building of the science and technology park would be built.

The plan is to announce tenders for the execution of works in the government and parliament of Serbia after the contract is confirmed, and we expect them to start by the end of this year, she announced.

Also, as she added, by the end of the year, work should begin on the construction of the BIO 4 campus in Belgrade, for which €10 million has been provided by today’s contract, and €200 million by the earlier loan agreement with the Development Bank of the Council of Europe.

The Prime Minister emphasised that these investments should help young highly educated people stay in their places and that the ICT sector, as the fastest growing in Serbia, continues to develop.

According to her, the ICT sector is responsible for every new second job in our country in 2021, for raising the average salary, for changing our economy, but also for greater attraction of capital-intensive investments, instead of labour-intensive ones, as was the case before.

Brnabic pointed out that the slowdown of the ICT sector in the world did not spill over to Serbia, so the information that appeared in the public does not apply to our country.

Many companies are just opening their centres in Serbia, and new companies of ours are also being created, while we still have a significant increase in employment.

The Prime Minister specified that the number of employees in the ICT sector in the first quarter of this year was RSD 105,400, which is RSD 17,000 more than in the first quarter of 2022, while the average net salary reached RSD 206,169.

In the first quarter, the export of ICT services amounted to 786 million euros, which is an increase of 44 percent compared to the same quarter last year, she specified, and said that it is expected that this export for the whole of 2023 will amount to four billion euros.

Colangeli stressed that these very ambitious projects to improve the scientific infrastructure will put Serbia on the world map when it comes to biotechnology.

He specified that the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development will also finance individual startups in Serbia, which, he said, has not been done in any other country.

Randjelovic reminded that the science and technology parks in Cacak and Nis were opened three years ago and that good results were achieved, because more than 100 companies and more than 600 young people work and create in them.

Thanks to that, we received the support of the government to enter into the further expansion and development of our parks. I hope that the implementation of this project will make it possible to raise the competitiveness of our cities and regions, to contribute to the retention of young, highly educated people in the regions of central Serbia and to enable Cacak, Nis and Krusevac to base their development on a knowledge-based economy, he concluded.