Record Growth of Industry

The year-on-year growth of industrial production in the first two months of 2018 has been 6.9 percent, it was said on the promotion of the April issue of the Macroeconomic Analysis and Trends magazine (MAT).

MAT analysts say that the total industrial production in Serbia at the end of 2017 reached the highest level of growth in the past 25 years, as did the processing industry.

In February, the total industrial production in Serbia was 3.3 percent higher than in the same month last year, according to MAT. MAT also finds that in the first two months of this year, production in all categories, except capital products, increased.

Exceptionally high year-on-year growth was recorded in consumer goods (17.1%) and intermediate products (except energy) (17.6%).

The dynamics of industrial production is satisfactory, since in the summer of 2014 the growth began and at the end of 2017 it broke two previous records, said the economist Ivan Nikolic.

Such a rapid growth of industry was not recorded even in the best decade before the collapse of Yugoslavia, Nikolic said, but added that this record is still 44.2 percent lower than the average industrial production in 1990.

It is not until 2026 that we’ll exit the transitional period, according to MAT.

Production of basic metals is growing thanks to the iron and steel plant in Smederevo, while the automotive industry, predominantly due to Fiat, recorded a year-on-year fall in production by 14% and 15% in January and February, respectively.

Foreign trade recorded a faster growth of imports than exports, as well as an increased deficit, which was higher by a third when compared to February 2017. After a remarkable January growth of 21.6 percent, in February the rates were significantly lower, exports grew by 6.7%, and imports by 12.5%, according to MAT coordinator Stojan Stamenkovic.

Serbia Will Not Be Unaffected by the Sino-American Trade War

The Serbian economy will feel the effects of the trade conflict and the imposition of import duties in the two largest world economies, the US and China.

“Serbia’s economy is on the rise, but for how long it will be sustainable in the long run will depend on the rising protectionism,” Miladin Kovacecic said.

He added that he didn’t expect the introduction of trade barriers between China and the US to escalate into a full-blown trade war like the ones that raged in 1930, although both countries are increasingly resorting to those measures.

Izvor: Danas, N1, various agencies

Foto: Beta