Reforms in Serbia: Achievements and Challenges Danica Popović

1. Reforms in Serbia: Achievements and Challenges Danica Popović Center for Liberal Democratic Studies Sava Centar, September 20th, 2008

2. Vulnerability indicators , Serbia, 2007.

3. Consolidated public consumption in Serbia, 2001-2008.

4. The Problem: • The existing share of public spending of over 40% of GDP is too high and unsustainable • and the internal balance in the medium-term critically depends on fiscal sustainability. • The expansionist fiscal policy from the previous years led to an accelerated increase in real wages • Wages grew (15.3% per year on average in the last five years, • while the annual GDP growth in this period was about 5.6% on average).

5. In recent years, budget capital expenditure increased its GDP share from 1.9% in 2005 to 3% in 2006 and to 4% in 2007, which relates to the National Investment Plan. Problem +

6. Real growt of gross wages, 2004-2007

7. Gross Wages 2004-2008 Realn growth of gross wages, 2004-2008. Pre-election wages growth, may 2006-may 2007.

9. Twin damage • Crowding out and slowing economic growth • Too large share of privatization receipts goes to consumption, as a typical case of disinvestments • Privatisation receipts are drying out • Fiscal deficit of 1% causes CA deficit in the same percent

10. Official data indicate 2.488,800 employees 795,000 unemployed  20002001200220032004200520062007 RZS 21.5 22,4 25.8 26.0 25,0 26.6 26.7 24.4 Survey 13,26 13,36 14,47 16,00 19,53 21,83 21,56 18,8 Source: RZS,.NBS i Anketa o radnoj snazi 2008

11. Inflation • Unlike most former socialist countries, Serbia did not succeed in maintaining a single digit inflation rate! • A double digit inflation rate in 2007. of 10,1% was caused by • Electricity, public utilities, tobacco, oil –non core • Exogeneous disturbances– agflation, rise in oil prices • Growth in aggregate demand which accomodated these shocksBazna inflacija je5,4%, - unutar predviđenog intervala 4–8%. • NBS was active in preventing the Dinar from nominal depreciations • As a consequence, dinar appreciated in real terms

12. Appreciation

13. And a BOP deficit • Which rose from 10% to 16,3% GDP [1] Marata 2008. godine devizne rezerve iznosile su 9,553 milijarde evra.

14. Foreign trade deficit • The key source of large foreign trade deficit consists of (still) low exports, • at the beginning of the transition were barely 15% of GDP • In 2007 the exports reached a third, imports reached a half of GDP • normal values in the countries of similar size are between 50 and 80% of GDP), • which means that the exports do not reach half the share in GDP that would be necessary in a growing, open economy. • Growing deficit is financed by foreing savings, partly via rise in indebtness, and the rest is covered by foreing direct investments.

15. Is this deficit OK? • The balance of payments current account deficit, which in the last twelve months increased from 3 to 5 billion euros (from 12.6% to 16.3% GDP) is NOT an a priori ultimate sign of economic deterioration. CAD=(Y*–Y)–(I*–I)–(G*–G), • Y is GDP (BDP), asterisk – long term level of the variable promenljive (up. Obstfeld i Rogoff, 1996). • All three phenomena are related to the first phases of transition, where both domestic product, investments and public consumption stay above their long term level.

16. DEBT- mаy 2008. 17.6 bil €o.w. private debt 11.6bil.

17. Liquidity risk • Serbian foreign reserves exceed manytimes the amount of short-term debt • (the situation is at least threetimes worse in all other countries observed) • and foreign reserves are higher by as much as 25% than the sum of the short-term debt andtotal current account deficit. • Therefore, this risk may not be consid-ered significant in Serbia, although any further deceleration of foreign reserves growth would present a very serious signal of increase in vul-nerability of the Serbian economy.

18. Greenfield FDIs could help

19. The experience of Portugal can be very indicative when discussing vulterabilities of Serbian economy • Investing in non-tradables – real estate, • High growth of wages, highly above TFP • recession!

20. Satisfactory growth rates

21. The Serbian economic policy seems to have adjusted the entire set of measures precisely to populist goals : • the overvalued exchange rate enabled higher imports of consumer goods and a higher standard of living, • high public spending, which enabled to a great extent the wage increase to exceed by far the increase in labor productivity and • delay in implementation of bankruptcy legislation enabled • a number of unproductive jobs, with unearned wages received, to be kept.

22. Foreign debt crisis?

23. Golden rule: for keeping the same level of competitiveness productivity growth = growth in real wages + currency appreciation

24. Conclusion I • Macroeconomic imbalances in the economy of Serbia threaten to hinder further accelerated economic growth. • For the purpose of lessening the key vulnerabilities, it is therefore necessary to: • (1) reduce public spending, especially current expenditure, which would make room for an increase in capital expenditure at the expense of subsidies and wage increases in the state sector, • (2) privatize public companies and, wherever possible, stimulate new entries in order forthe party-based management structure of these companies to be replaced with private owners, and for the competition to enable an increase in the quality of their products and services along with a price decrease, • (3) continue attracting foreign direct investments to the tradables sector, primarily by controlling wages in the state-owned sector, by avoiding any further appreciation of the dinar and by continuing the reforms that will increase the competitiveness of the economic environment in Serbia

25. Conclusion II In addition to reducing public spending, most of the conditions that should be met for the maintenance of macroeconomic stability are clearly in the area of microeconomy and reform of government administration.