VUČIĆEVIĆ: Agreement on free trade between Serbia and Russia without any results

General manager of "Grand caffa" and the chairman of the Administrative Board of "Štark", Slobodan Vučićević, estimated that the agreement on free trade between Serbia and Russia did not give any results, although it was exceptionally good.

Vučićević expressed his regret because the changes in the business climate were "not going faster", pointing out that, due to “too strong relations between politics and business“, there are no big foreign companies any more and the investments are small.

He says that the the direct foreign investments in Serbia amounted to about 1.9 billion USD in 2005, whereas, in the period from 2002 to 2005, total of 4.8 billion USD entered Serbia. For the sake of comparison, 13 billion USD worth of foreign investments were realized in Slovakia in 2005, whereas Czech Republic obtained investments worth 11.4 billion USD.

Vučićević estimated that Grand prom, through establishment of partnership with group Droga-Kolinska, had become part of the family with the regional tone, pointing out that these united companies will have the turnover worth 350m EUR in 2006.