ALBANIA/KOSOVO/FILE: Kosovo marks the sixth anniversary of its declaration of independence from Serbia looking at ways to improve economic cooperation with neighbouring Albania

Record ID: 564909

  • Title: ALBANIA/KOSOVO/FILE: Kosovo marks the sixth anniversary of its declaration of independence from Serbia looking at ways to improve economic cooperation with neighbouring Albania
  • Date: 17th February 2014
  • Summary: PRISTINA, KOSOVO (FILE - JANUARY 11, 2014) (REUTERS) VARIOUS OF DOWNTOWN PRISTINA
  • Embargoed: 4th March 2014 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Kosovo, Albania
  • City:
  • Country: Kosovo Albania
  • Topics: Conflict,International Relations,Economy,Politics
  • Reuters ID: LVA67PACNXNSK3H4X7DJEGOZKSN8
  • Story Text: Shortly after Kosovo declared independence from Serbia six years ago, neighbouring Albania said it would bequeath its Adriatic port of Shengjin to its landlocked ethnic kin.
    The port, nestled on a scenic bay, is "the closest to Kosovo," about 125 km (77 miles) away, a poster in the office of Shengjin manager Gjovalin Tusha helpfully points out.
    Albania's gesture meant much to majority-Albanian Kosovo as it sought to forge a path independent of Serbia and the Western aid and remittances that had propped it up since a 1998-99 war.
    Tirana proposed that Pristina take over the running and enlargement of the port as, in effect, its own outlet to the sea. Little came of it and the trickle of Kosovo-bound goods through the shallow wharf has failed to match the lofty talk.
    "In 2013, merchandise processing for Kosovo businesses was at a minimum, about 4,500 tonnes, or a ship and a half out of 126 to 130 ships," Tusha told Reuters in Shengjin.
    Shipments for Kosovo, most of whose two million people are ethnic Albanians, out of neighbouring Albania's ports, best show their governments talked patriotism rather than business and did little to create economies of scale.
    Pressed by the euro zone crisis to create export-driven economies, wean themselves off remittances and expand markets to lure investors, both governments of two of Europe's poorest countries met in mid-January to agree on boosting links.
    Kosovo and Albania "should live in a joint market", said Behgjet Pacolli, Kosovo's deputy premier and a Swiss-made millionaire. But he added that there were legally more things dividing the two countries" sharing the same blood and language.
    "Until now, legally there are more things that divide us. But people are trying to connect, they have the wish and feel more united. But if you see the law and documentation nothing has changed. There is just a wish list. We had the first meeting with two governments in Prizren. That did happen. But what is happening now except some visits? I don't see any joint project," he said.
    "Politicians should speak another language, 100 percent the language of economy. This area needs a dynamic economy which today's does not exist," Pacolli told Reuters.
    Albania passed a law to liberalize jobs from Kosovo's northern town of Mitrovica to its south on the Greek border.
    Its five-month premier Edi Rama saw the meeting as "the first step of a new chapter" and urged Balkan countries to join "to make the best out of this new peace in the Balkans".
    "At the end, it is the expression of a very strong will to make the best out of this new peace in the Balkans," Rama said.
    "It is time to build bridges, to build cooperations, to build partnerships and to give a new sense to regional cooperation," he added.
    He listed energy security, agriculture, customs and tourism as areas of cooperation and said there were other sites on the seaside in addition to Shengjin for developing new ports.
    Kosovo hackers called the Albanians "traitors" in an attack on Shengjin port's website when Chinese officials toured the port to see where a 2.2 billion euro port could be built.
    They did not know less than a third of Kosovo's imports by sea come via Albania. The bulk of it comes from Montenegro's port of Bar and Greece's Thessaloniki port via Macedonia.
    Costly four lane highways connect now the two countries.
    Some 125 kms from Shengjin, trucks with cement and fuel crossed over at Morina and one with scrap iron came into Albania after rush hour past lunchtime. No queuing there.
    Trade suffers from a "very high structural deficit, with anaemic exports mainly of raw materials of little added value and imports covering even products which had historically been largely produced domestically", a study by economists said.
    Albanian imports from Kosovo amounted to 1 percent of its total while exports were 8.15 percent. Kosovo's imports from Albania were 3.19 percent of its total while exports 10.8 percent. They also exchange power through a 220 kV line.
    When a 400 kV power between Albania and Kosovo is built in 28 months, the two systems would be "almost a perfect match" of the lignite-based power production in Kosovo and river water in Albania, the World Bank's Kosovo manager Jan-Peter Olters said.
    "Just the exchange for peak demand in the sector would immensely help to integrate both economies much, much more than have seen so far," Olters told Reuters.
    "There is perception that Kosovo is a risky country to invest and that perception has to be addressed. You've seen where Kosovo stand in Transparency International's corruption perception index. Investors look at that clearly," he added.
    Kosovo ranked 111th on Transparency International's graft perception index, on a par with Ethiopia and Tanzania, while 116th Albania was rated as the most corrupt in the Balkans.
    Dubbed the "Nation's Road" since it linked two Albanian lands, it was also meant to help combine agricultural produce.
    The owner of a potato chip producer, Bedri Kosumi imported potatoes from the EU countries for his year-round needs but no potatoes could be had in June in Kosovo.
    "There should be a higher trade because Kosovo and Albania they do not compete each other but they complement each other. As an argument I can say that we produce potatoes in Albania because of climatic conditions, we get earlier product from there and from Kosovo because of climatic reasons we get a late production of potatoes,"he told Reuters.
    If his model of business spreads, both stand to gain.
    He still prays, however, that a trade war over reference prices for potatoes in 2009 and 2011 does not happen again.
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