Imports to Bosnia and Herzegovina from Japan are 40 times more valuable than domestic exports to this distant Asian country. Although the range of goods being exported is quite wide and includes products such as plastic, glass, wine, handicrafts, textiles, car parts, paper …, the problem is that quantities are negligible.
Investors and importers from Japan appear to be interested in BiH’s tourism offer, but also in domestic products, especially honey, which was also discussed with representatives of the Investment Promotion Agency of BiH (FIPA) by a Japanese delegation who visited BiH.
Although BiH businessmen would be happy to export, the problem is that Japan is far away and there is not enough incentive for the state and entities to be competitive.
Nemanja Vasic, President of the BiH’s Foreign Trade Chamber, points out to Nezavisne Novine that because of Japan’s distance, almost every product from BiH is unprofitable for export, since it is a smaller quantity, and because BiH simply does not have a larger quantity of a product.
“This is one of the main reasons for small exports,” – says Vasic, pointing out that honey was exported to Japan as an example.
He adds that they have had similar discussions with China when it comes to honey exports. However, China wanted for honey to be exported in containers.
“Because of this, our beekeepers joked to each other that they could only collect one container together. So we have states with which it is not realistic to expect equilibrium. Of course, we have an imbalance, because Japan exports expensive goods, cars and similar, but the situation can still be improved,” says Vasic, who emphasizes that the development of tourism has been on the rise in the last year or two, for which there is interest in Japan.
Therefore, as he claims, tourism is something that needs to be encouraged more. Mirko Sarovic, Minister of Foreign Trade and Economic Relations of BiH, also believes that the problems of trade with these countries are a small production from BiH for such a large market, but also because of distance, Ekapija business portal reports.
