prijava
MOSTAR, January 31 (FENA) - The coronavirus epidemic has affected the operations of almost all segments of the BiH economy, while the tourism and catering sectors have been hit the hardest, President of the FBiH Chamber of Commerce Marko Šantić told FENA.
“Tourism in all its key matters has fallen by over 60 percent, and the revenues, overnight stays, i.e. tourist arrivals have fallen by about 90-95 percent in 2020. Right behind tourism is the transport sector, which has fallen over 30 percent in all key indicators. This is followed by industrial production, which fell by seven to eight percent in BiH, followed by retail sales of over eight percent, imports fell by 13 percent and exports by 16 percent. All of these are certain indicators that the gross domestic product will probably be somewhere between 9.5 and 10 percent in decline at the end of the year,” said Šantić.
The FBiH Chamber of Commerce itself was not spared, so the association was forced to reduce employees' salaries by 30 percent.
“We, as an association that gathers companies in the Federation of BiH through various associations, more precisely 21 of them, share the fate of the real sector, both in business and in salaries. We had certain problems, but we are trying to manage the crisis because that is the only way to properly and adequately respond to this crisis,” said Šantić.
Šantić also reminded that the FBiH Chamber of Commerce organized an informal headquarters of businessmen at the very beginning of the pandemic to help the domestic economy.
“The FBiH Government reacted as much as it could in the first place, in the beginning, we were not all satisfied, but there are several reasons such as the shock of the pandemic, lack of plans, unpreparedness for such crises and the like. However, the Government soon reacted, followed by the so-called "corona laws", and sometime in October, November 2020, the Government consolidated, collected funds from all accounts and sub-accounts in the Federation, created a guarantee fund and injected funds first into companies which deal with exports, transport companies and companies dealing with tourism, and I think that at this moment we all have to be satisfied with what we have because that is our reality,” said Šantić.
He added that BiH is an underdeveloped country that does not have the funds available as the European Union and cannot afford "lockdowns" like Germany and other developed countries in the Union at this time.
The Head of the FBiH Chamber of Commerce hopes that some opportunities will open up in this crisis as well.
Regarding the future activities and plans of the FBiH Chamber of Commerce, Šantić said that, until the situation normalizes, the chamber's work will continue with respect to epidemiological measures.
(FENA) A. B.
