EU Forecasts GDP Growth, Lower Inflation for Serbia

European Commission/PHOTO/Guillaume Périgois

The European Commission reported on May 15 that Serbia's growth rate would reach 3.5 percent in 2024, and that by 2025 annual growth would reach 4.3 percent.

In its regular Spring Economic Forecast for EU member states and candidate countries, the Commission said that the GDP growth projections were impacted by "personal consumption, resulting from an increase in real wages, and exports, benefitting from the expansion of production capacities due to direct foreign investments."

While reminding that the inflation rate in Serbia had slowly declined over the past quarters to reach five percent in March, the Commission suggests that in mid-2024 it will return to the National Bank of Serbia’s target inflation rate of three percent plus/minus 1.5 percent. The EC also expects the inflation rate to drop to just over three percent the following year.

In the region, the European Commission forecasts annual economic growth of 3.8 percent for Montenegro, expecting it to slow down to three percent next year. For North Macedonia, the forecast is 2.9 percent for this year and three percent for 2025, while for Bosnia and Herzegovina, it is 2.3 percent for this year and 2.8 percent for 2025.