Fiscal Council: Serbia Failing Behind in Economic Development Due to Corruption

Vucic Nominates Pavle Petrovic for Chairman of Fiscal Council

The main reason why Serbia is lagging behind in economic development relative to the countries of Central and Eastern Europe - Romania, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia, is due to the poor quality of its institutions which are plagued by corruption and an insufficient level of rule of law, Fiscal Council President Pavle Petrovic said on May 4.

In an interview with BETA, Petrovic was asked whether Serbia would start closing the gap with comparative countries if it achieved an economic growth rate of six percent this year. He replied that strong economic growth during one year did not mean much, especially in these very turbulent times.

"Economic growth needs to be observed over a somewhat longer period, and when one views things over a longer period of time one sees that Serbia's average GDP growth rate is 3.5 percent to four percent per annum, while it would have to equal around five percent to catch up to the more developed countries of Central and Eastern Europe," Petrovic said, adding that some years Serbia had better results and other years worse results, although overall its economic growth was unsatisfactory.