Publication: Western Balkans Regular Economic Report No.24, Fall 2023: Toward Sustainable Growth
Loading...
Other Files
81 downloads
125 downloads
118 downloads
Date
2023-10-19
ISSN
Published
2023-10-19
Author(s)
Editor(s)
Abstract
In the context of weakening global demand, growth in the Western Balkans decelerated over the course of 2022 and into 2023. Against the background of the lasting effects of shocks from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, sticky inflation, and tighter financial conditions, global demand has been weakening, and this has a divergent impact across the Western Balkans (WB6). On the one hand, the slowdown in global demand contributed to weaker-than expected performance of industrial production in the whole European Union (EU) region and in the WB6. On the other hand, global demand has proved more resilient in services and, for travel, with twice as many people traveling globally during Q1 2023 as in the same period in 2022 (UNWTO). This has particularly benefited Albania, Kosovo, and Montenegro, where services exports have reached new record highs. In contrast, weakening global demand for goods has weighed on Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH), North Macedonia and Serbia. On the demand side, private consumption remained in general an important growth driver, despite rising price pressures. Reforms are needed to consolidate the recovery toward sustainable growth, while negotiations with the EU hold the potential to bolster prospects in the Western Balkans. As the WB6 agriculture sector is undergoing a major structural transformation, efforts to green agriculture are also important to ensure access to the EU market and for the competitiveness of agriculture, rural development, and food and nutrition security. Most WB6 countries have recently included agriculture greening in their development strategies. Historically, the environmental footprint of the WB6 agriculture sector has been relatively low. But this has been more an unintended outcome of still high rurality and low farming intensity rather than a result of public policy and expenditure choices. Agricultural public expenditures, while substantial in terms of amounts and adequate to influence agricultural production, have not yet prioritized financing of greening and climate-smart agriculture. It is important for the WB6 countries to accelerate greening of their agriculture by learning from the EU’s green transition and better utilization of the existing public funds available for agricultural development.
Link to Data Set
Citation
“World Bank. 2023. Western Balkans Regular Economic Report No.24, Fall 2023: Toward Sustainable Growth. © World Bank. http://hdl.handle.net/10986/40496 License: CC BY-NC 3.0 IGO.”
Associated URLs
Associated content
Other publications in this report series
Journal
Journal Volume
Journal Issue
Related items
Showing items related by metadata.
Publication Western Balkans Regular Economic Report, No.22, Fall 2022(Washington, DC, 2022-10)The economies of the Western Balkans continue to face a turbulent external environment, placing households, firms, and governments under acute stress. Just as the post-COVID recovery of 2021 began to fade and the region returned to a normalized rate of economic growth, the Western Balkan region now faces a new combination of challenges. The war in Ukraine, and the resultant sharp increase and energy prices and slowdown in global growth, is weighing on economic performance in all six economies. Higher energy and food prices have pushed inflation to levels unseen for many years, eroding purchasing power and business confidence. Monetary tightening in advanced economies is pushing up financing costs and weakening external demand. Following a strong rebound in 2021, growth, although still robust, was on a decelerating path in the first half of 2022. In Q1 of 2022, the Western Balkan economies remained resilient overall, supported by sizable policy actions at the EU, euro area, and national levels. First-quarter growth was particularly strong in tourism-based economies and in Serbia. However, growth decelerated in Q2, as countries had to deal with the direct consequences of the war and is projected to continue decelerating in the second half of the year reflecting higher base levels of growth in Q3 and Q4 2021 and the stronger global headwinds.Publication Western Balkans Regular Economic Report No. 25, Spring 2024(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2024-04-11)Economic growth in the Western Balkans slowed to 2.6 percent in 2023, from the 3.4 percent reached in 2022, reflecting the impact of a weak European economy weighed down by sequential shocks. Overall, the WB6 region has experienced a rise in total hours worked driven by employment growth and labor force expansion, especially driven by women joining the labor force. Poverty in the Western Balkans returned to its declining trend during 2023, but at a slower pace than pre-pandemic. A robust fiscal performance and solid rate of gross domestic product (GDP) growth led to a fall in debt as a share of GDP. After increasing to levels not seen in several decades, inflation rates in the WB6 fell significantly during 2023. Growth projections for the medium term have increased slightly, reflecting cautious optimism that, having weathered a flurry of shocks over recent years, the Western Balkans is beginning to see a return to trend economic performance. However, while the WB6 region is expected to return on its pre-pandemic trend in 2024, this is insufficient to enable meaningful convergence with European Union (EU) income levels over the medium term. The spotlight in this edition of the Western Balkans Regular Economic Report focuses on the role of cities as engines of growth and leading actor in the green transition. This spotlight recommends action on three main fronts to make cities in the Western Balkans greener. First, it is crucial to reduce urban sprawl and make cities more compact. Second, cities must bring down their emissions, also because this will have immediate improvement on socio-economic and environmental outcomes. And third, cities must take actions to reduce extreme urban heat and enhance preparedness for it.Publication Western Balkans Regular Economic Report No.23, Spring 2023(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2023-06-16)The six countries of the Western Balkans have seen their resilience tested over the last three years. Growth in the Western Balkan economies started strong in early 2022, before moderating toward year-end, but the impact of major shocks, such as electricity and heating outages, has been less severe than expected. Inflation surged to a two-decade high in 2022 in almost all economies, and price pressures remain elevated in early 2023. Higher food and energy prices have affected low-income households especially severely, resulting in a much slower pace of poverty reduction in 2022 despite universal government support. In the medium term, the Western Balkans continues to have a positive outlook, but reforms are needed to rebuild buffers, accelerate the green transition, and to address key structural challenges. The ongoing energy crisis has highlighted the need to accelerate the green transition across Europe, including in the Western Balkans. A key starting point in this regard is to accelerate the move toward carbon pricing and to increase the use of environmental fiscal measures that incentivize households and firms to shift toward lower carbon intensity with respect to economic activity.Publication Western Balkans Regular Economic Report, No. 20, Fall 2021(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2021-10-20)Fiscal balances have started to improve as a result of a stronger economic performance, but it will take further effort to replenish buffers. The growth recovery is contributing to buoyant revenue collection across the region, particularly in value-added tax collections, as domestic consumption strengthens. Similarly, a leveling off of public spending in 2021 after the countercyclical surge of 2020 is helping on the expenditure side. As a result, all countries except Bosnia and Herzegovina expect to see a narrower fiscal deficit in 2021, with the average deficit reduced by 2.7 percent of GDP year-on-year. However, the deficits across all economies of the Western Balkans are still above pre-pandemic trends, and the legacy of the pandemic is a stock of public debt that has now reached historic highs in all countries except Serbia and Bosnia and Herzegovina. As the recovery from COVID-19 takes hold, greater efforts will be needed to mobilize and diversify sources of revenue and to streamline expenditure programs, which in turn would help address fiscal vulnerabilities that have arisen during the crisis. In line with global conditions, inflationary pressures in the Western Balkans are on an upward trajectory. Average inflation is projected to reach 2.3 percent in 2021 from 0.9 percent in 2020. On the external side, strengthening demand in advanced economies is driving commodity prices upward and putting pressure on COVID-19-strained logistics networks and global value chains. Similarly, the faster-than-expected recovery in domestic consumption across the region has placed upward pressure on domestic costs, particularly in labor markets during the summer tourism season.Publication Western Balkans Regular Economic Report No. 27, Spring 2025(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2025-04-29)The Western Balkans Regular Economic Report highlights the significant impact of extreme climate events on labor markets in the region. Rising temperatures, heavy precipitation, and other severe weather events are exacerbating existing vulnerabilities and creating new challenges for both workers and employers. These climate changes, combined with the global shift towards a low-carbon economy, are reshaping employment patterns in key sectors such as energy, agriculture, and tourism. Direct climate impacts, including heat stress, droughts, and floods, are affecting workers, their families, and businesses. Additionally, structural shifts in employment demand and skills requirements are emerging. For instance, areas dependent on tourism in the Western Balkans are increasingly susceptible to extreme weather events, which can lead to a decrease in visitor numbers, disrupt revenue streams, and threaten local jobs. Looking forward, the changing climate and the transition to a greener economy will necessitate significant workforce adaptation. This includes reforms to social protection systems and employment services to better safeguard individuals and facilitate labor market transitions. These measures are essential to protect people and support the evolving demands of the labor market in response to climate change.
Users also downloaded
Showing related downloaded files
Publication Morocco Economic Update, Winter 2025(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2025-04-03)Despite the drought causing a modest deceleration of overall GDP growth to 3.2 percent, the Moroccan economy has exhibited some encouraging trends in 2024. Non-agricultural growth has accelerated to an estimated 3.8 percent, driven by a revitalized industrial sector and a rebound in gross capital formation. Inflation has dropped below 1 percent, allowing Bank al-Maghrib to begin easing its monetary policy. While rural labor markets remain depressed, the economy has added close to 162,000 jobs in urban areas. Morocco’s external position remains strong overall, with a moderate current account deficit largely financed by growing foreign direct investment inflows, underpinned by solid investor confidence indicators. Despite significant spending pressures, the debt-to-GDP ratio is slowly declining.Publication Europe and Central Asia Economic Update, Spring 2025: Accelerating Growth through Entrepreneurship, Technology Adoption, and Innovation(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2025-04-23)Business dynamism and economic growth in Europe and Central Asia have weakened since the late 2000s, with productivity growth driven largely by resource reallocation between firms and sectors rather than innovation. To move up the value chain, countries need to facilitate technology adoption, stronger domestic competition, and firm-level innovation to build a more dynamic private sector. Governments should move beyond broad support for small- and medium-sized enterprises and focus on enabling the most productive firms to expand and compete globally. Strengthening competition policies, reducing the presence of state-owned enterprises, and ensuring fair market access are crucial. Limited availability of long-term financing and risk capital hinders firm growth and innovation. Economic disruptions are a shock in the short term, but they provide an opportunity for implementing enterprise and structural reforms, all of which are essential for creating better-paying jobs and helping countries in the region to achieve high-income status.Publication Argentina Country Climate and Development Report(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2022-11)The Argentina Country Climate and Development Report (CCDR) explores opportunities and identifies trade-offs for aligning Argentina’s growth and poverty reduction policies with its commitments on, and its ability to withstand, climate change. It assesses how the country can: reduce its vulnerability to climate shocks through targeted public and private investments and adequation of social protection. The report also shows how Argentina can seize the benefits of a global decarbonization path to sustain a more robust economic growth through further development of Argentina’s potential for renewable energy, energy efficiency actions, the lithium value chain, as well as climate-smart agriculture (and land use) options. Given Argentina’s context, this CCDR focuses on win-win policies and investments, which have large co-benefits or can contribute to raising the country’s growth while helping to adapt the economy, also considering how human capital actions can accompany a just transition.Publication Classroom Assessment to Support Foundational Literacy(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2025-03-21)This document focuses primarily on how classroom assessment activities can measure students’ literacy skills as they progress along a learning trajectory towards reading fluently and with comprehension by the end of primary school grades. The document addresses considerations regarding the design and implementation of early grade reading classroom assessment, provides examples of assessment activities from a variety of countries and contexts, and discusses the importance of incorporating classroom assessment practices into teacher training and professional development opportunities for teachers. The structure of the document is as follows. The first section presents definitions and addresses basic questions on classroom assessment. Section 2 covers the intersection between assessment and early grade reading by discussing how learning assessment can measure early grade reading skills following the reading learning trajectory. Section 3 compares some of the most common early grade literacy assessment tools with respect to the early grade reading skills and developmental phases. Section 4 of the document addresses teacher training considerations in developing, scoring, and using early grade reading assessment. Additional issues in assessing reading skills in the classroom and using assessment results to improve teaching and learning are reviewed in section 5. Throughout the document, country cases are presented to demonstrate how assessment activities can be implemented in the classroom in different contexts.Publication World Development Report 2006(Washington, DC, 2005)This year’s Word Development Report (WDR), the twenty-eighth, looks at the role of equity in the development process. It defines equity in terms of two basic principles. The first is equal opportunities: that a person’s chances in life should be determined by his or her talents and efforts, rather than by pre-determined circumstances such as race, gender, social or family background. The second principle is the avoidance of extreme deprivation in outcomes, particularly in health, education and consumption levels. This principle thus includes the objective of poverty reduction. The report’s main message is that, in the long run, the pursuit of equity and the pursuit of economic prosperity are complementary. In addition to detailed chapters exploring these and related issues, the Report contains selected data from the World Development Indicators 2005‹an appendix of economic and social data for over 200 countries. This Report offers practical insights for policymakers, executives, scholars, and all those with an interest in economic development.