Millions in Stara Pazova – municipal management decided to change spatial plan to enable "EyeMaxx" to build logistic center

At the moment when foreign investments are nowhere to be seen, the news that Austrian company “EyeMaxx” is going to invest 300m EUR in Stara Pazova is quite encouraging. After numerous obstacles and two years of uncertainty, "EyeMaxx" is getting ready to commence construction of the logistic center.

That action required the change of the city authorities in order for the agricultural land at which the Austrians plan to build the largest logistic enter in southeast Europe to be renamed into industrial land.

– On the occasion of the adoption of spatial plan, former municipal management did not include the parcel at 50 ha, between the Novi Sad highway and the Zagreb highway, in the commercial zone. Stara Pazova should not miss this investment opportunity that would create about 3,000 new jobs. Therefore, we have recently made the decision to change the spatial plan. I hope that that document will be accepted by the Commission for Plans right away, and that the investor will get the building permit in as short time as possible – says Dragiša Lajović, a representative of group of citizens “Preporod”, which mainly consists of local businessmen, in the City Council.

Muamer Ragipopović, the Director of "EyeMaxx" in Serbia, points out that this company did not buy the land without plan. Former municipal administration, which mainly consisted of the members of Serbian Radical Party, assured them two years ago that the parcel between the two highways had been reserved for development of commercial zone, but once they procured the cultivated fields, they realized they were deceived.

– Commercial zone has, simply, gone round our lot. We have turned to the Executive Council of Vojvodina and all authorized ministries for help. We have also included the Embassy of Austria in the story because our banking guarantee was about to expire – says Ragipopović.

However, there are still many problems that have to be resolved. So far, only the first phase of this project has been made possible. "EyeMaxx" still needs to buy another 90 ha of land, but the locals have increased the prices of land six times after they heard what was going to happen.

– I do not want to generalize what happens in Stara Pazova because the situation in Niš, in which we also plan to invest 160m EUR and to build a bit smaller logistic center, is completely different since everything goes as planned and we have no trouble to get all the necessary building permits. People in Europe carefully survey the situation in Serbia, and it will not be good if they get the impression that the business ambience in Serbia is bad, because the current authorities do their best to improve it – says the Director of "EyeMaxx" in Serbia.

– The new Law on organization of space, building land and construction stipulates that the municipalities must adopt two basic plans within the given period. If they fail to do that, the assembly will be dismissed – says Aleksandra Damjanović-Petrović, the Assistant to the Minister of Environment Protection and Spatial Planning.

(Note: the complete text is taken from newspaper Politika of March 1st, 2009)