Vucic: Businessmen, learn from your Swiss colleagues

BELGRADE - Serbia's Prime Minister-Designate Aleksandar Vucic said on Thursday that Serbia is a good place for investment, better than many countries in the region, and that the reforms will be carried out to improve a business environment.

At a ceremonial meeting on the occasion of the establishment of a Swiss-Serbian Chamber of Commerce, which was attended by President of the Swiss Confederation Didier Burkhalter, he said to Serbian businessmen that they have much to learn from their Swiss colleagues.

Noting certain steps forward in the last two years, especially given that the import/export ratio rose from 31.9 to 49.1 percent, Vucic said that the most important thing is to learn from Swiss friends how to be a responsible, serious and reliable partner.

For 25 years, there was no courage for conducting reforms that would create a better business environment for arrival of more foreign companies, Vucic said.

"In talks with Burkhalter, I have underlined that Serbia will become a better place for investment, that laws will be changed and everything that hindered private business, and I am convinced that we will have more Swiss investments in coming years," Vucic said.

He said that it is not fitting to compare the Swiss and Serbian economies, but there will be more success in Serbia if we realize that "money does not grow on trees, but that it has to be earned".

Wishing businessmen every success, he warned that Swiss companies come to Serbia only when they know they could make profit.