Since 2008, Bosnia has enjoyed almost completely free access to the EU market, exporting all categories of products there without fees, as part of an SAA and an Interim Agreement signed in the same year. However, as of January 1, Bosnian farmers wanting to export their produce to the EU will have to pay tariffs, after Brussels suspended a trade liberalisation deal.
The move has worried Bosnian farmers for whom the EU is their most important trade partner. EU countries accounted for 77 per cent of the Bosnian exports and 60 per cent of its imports in 2015, according to the Statistics Agency. Bosnian farmers fear the EU's decision to curb trade liberalisation with their country will have a serious impact later in the year after the harvest.
The EU adopted trade liberalisation agreements with countries in the Western Balkans wishing to join the EU in order to speed up their economic integration.
Since Croatia joined the EU in July 2013, however, Brussels has been asking Bosnia to update the SAA in order to take account of traditional economic relation between the two countries under the Central European Free Trade Agreement, CEFTA. This means updating the economic quotas included in the SAA.
So far, however, Bosnia has refused to review the terms of the SAA, claiming that this would damage its economy.
"The EU's decision won't impact immediately on our business because it's winter. But our government needs to find a solution by June or July, when production peaks, or it will become very difficult," Nermin Basic, director of Baso, a company from Velika Kladusa that exports fruits and vegetables to the EU, told BIRN.
Source: balkaninsight.com
