New trade agreement between Serbia and Great Britain to be required by end-2020

By the end of this year, Serbia, as well as the European Union, will have to define the future of their trade with Great Britain, which officially left the EU on January 31, the Chamber of Commerce of Serbia told Tanjug.

Representatives of the competent ministries are talking to British officials, and the outcome of those talks is expected to be clear by the end of the year.

– We would have to sign some kind of a legal framework which would clearly define the rules of cooperation this or next year. This legal framework will depend on how the EU negotiates the technical details of the future trade and economic relations with Great Britain – says the adviser to the president of the Chamber of Commerce of Serbia, Mihajlo Vesovic.

Serbia has a free trade agreement with the EU through the Stabilization and Association Process.

By the end of 2020, Great Britain should still use the customs tariffs which were in effect while it was a member of the EU, but the economy wants to know what happens afterwards and whether the country would make new free trade agreements with individual countries, including Serbia.

Mutual trade conditions for Serbia companies which do business with Great Britain will not change by the end of the year, the Chamber says.

In the past several years, the merchandise trade between Serbia and Great Britain has been growing, and the latest available data, those for November 2019, put the surplus on the Serbian side, amounting to EUR 88 million.

Privredna komora Srbije

Chamber of Commerce of Serbia

CCIS

trade with Great Britain

Mihajlo Vesovic

free trade agreement with the EU

Stabilization and Association Process

trade of Serbia and Great Britain