According to data of the Central Bank, it is clear that BiH Diaspora sends more than 3 billion BAM every year to BiH through remittances and only through formal channels, since a lot of people from diaspora send money in BiH informally, which cannot be traced.
“There is a great interest of BiH diaspora to invest in BiH, and what prevents most of investors are huge administrative barriers and conditions set to them as investors. During the period when the current privatization was quite interested in investing in this segment, but due to the disorganization of society they unfortunately were not realized. Due to the negligence of the government and its structures, many companies that could be salvaged continue to deteriorate and the workers are still unable to realize their rights,” said representative of the Diaspora for England, Ceric.
Ceric said that diaspora invests in almost all areas, lately more in the eco and rural tourism, healthy food and similar services.
About the Diaspora and its investment through the support of the state and its institutions, Ceric said that it is necessary and inevitable. “State institutions are the ones that form the business environment in which clearly diaspora will be the first to invest. Therefore we need to provide conditions and incentives that will encourage our diaspora to invest even more, because it is ready for it,” said Ceric.
“According to the Ministry of Human Rights and Refugees it is estimated that there is around 2 million citizens of BiH in the world, in 52 countries. It is almost 50 % of the population of this country, which makes BiH the 1st in Europe and 7th in the world in the share of immigrants in relation to the overall population.
Naida Ribic, the newly elected vice-president of SSD and president of Business Club from the Netherlands, which gathers all the businessmen from BiH in that part of the world, says that the biggest problem why someone does not want to invest is (i)responsibility of individuals. “When you bring order and discipline in the work itself, everything will be better. When we start from the individual in BiH, when we understand that our state will progress with the help of paid taxes, that these funds are going for their retirements or for the education of their children, only then will be created completely different image of society, which is willing to work and act in accordance with the regulations and laws that will bring them prosperity and progress and open the market for investments,” said Ribic.
Ribic emphasized that the first steps that BiH should take is restoring the confidence of diaspora, providing favorable loans, facilitating procedures for establishing companies that BiH diaspora can start and much more, and the main thing is to change the consciousness of the individual, and everything else will be changed accordingly. “Diaspora is a great resource for investments and we should use it, and we can achieve this only by working together.”
First Congress of the Diaspora of BiH was held in 2002 in Vogosca, and it gathered representatives from 23 countries. SSD BiH has representatives from 17 countries.
(Source: akta.ba)
