Serbia has made good progress in expanding its digital services and infrastructure, but there are areas for further improvement, according to the fourth Semi-annual report on the business environment (BE) in Serbia prepared by the ‘EU for Better Business Environment’ (EU4BE) project, supported by the European Union (EU) and implemented by the World Bank (WB).
The report analyses progress in BE in Serbia against more than 20 international benchmarks and identifies reform priorities and gaps in the regulatory framework for businesses. It also provides a basis for prioritization and coordination of business enabling reforms among the stakeholders.
Check the report for findings, among them:
DIGITAL SERVICES AND INFRASTRUCTURE
“Advancement in e-Government includes enabling electronic registration of businesses and e-Payment for a portion of services, a range of electronic services for taxpayers, etc. Challenges remain in areas such as data exchange and service interoperability, highlighting the need for continued investment and policy refinement to achieve further digital transformation.”
REGULATORY & ADMINISTRATIVE BURDENS
“Despite recent efforts to reduce regulatory and administrative burdens, challenges remain, particularly for small and medium enterprises (SMEs). These challenges include high parafiscal charges, cumbersome tax procedures, and low utilization of electronic services.
E-Commerce
“The conditions for doing e-commerce in Serbia are satisfactory. Estimated retail e-commerce in Serbia exceeds one billion dollars in 2022, with significant growth of e-traffic in the period 2020-2022, and the annual growth rate of e-retail of 46.1% in 2022. As of end 2023, 58 percent of companies are satisfied with e-commerce conditions, with an overall average satisfaction rating of 3.6 (on a scale of 1 to 5). Medium and large enterprises are particularly satisfied with e-commerce conditions (83 percent), while the satisfaction level is lower among micro and small companies (approximately 50 percent of them).