The head of the European Union Delegation to Serbia, Vincent Degert, said on Oct. 13 that the EU had invested EUR2.2 billion or EUR300 per head in Serbia over the last 10 years.

At the presentation of the European Commission's opinion on the fulfillment of conditions for Serbia to receive EU candidate status in the Serbian Chamber of Commerce, he said that this much would not have been invested in Serbia if it did not want to join the EU.

According to Degert, Serbia cannot expect larger resources from European funds during the process of EU accession, but that it can count on a lot more investment.

He underscored that structural reforms which lessen the state's role in the economy were needed in Serbia because the state was currently overbearing, and lessen the state's involvement in the regulation of prices because currently the state controls 20 percent of the cost of the consumer basket.

"Serbia also has strong monopolies, such as the Electric Power Industry of Serbia (EPS), Telekom, (Serbian) Railways and Jat, which account for between two and six percent of the GDP annually from the pockets of taxpayers, and you need to deal with this," said Degert.