BiH Needs Tough and Compelling Arguments
from Business Community
The Principal Deputy High Representative, Larry Butler,
will speak this afternoon at an investment conference in
Sarajevo
. Ambassador Butler will
call for a more forthright role for entrepreneurs, employers, managers and
trades union members in lobbying for a better business environment in BiH.
A better business environment means more investment – which means more
jobs.
Next week the BiH House of Representatives will discuss the Debt Framework
Law, which is part of a comprehensive debt settlement that will allocate
compensation to creditors of the governments while ensuring that government
liabilities are manageable. This will remove what has been until now a
disastrous deterrent to inward investment. It will remove the large and
debilitating question mark over public finances in BiH that has raised the
spectre of sudden tax rises to pay off huge debt claims.
Another major step forward will be the enactment of a modernized Law on
Obligations, which will bring the BiH business environment into the
21st century by providing, for example, for the proper regulation of
e-commerce and international electronic funds transfer. This law is expected to
be enacted by the end of 2005.
Ambassador Butler will call on BiH businesspeople to lobby the governments so
that short-term political considerations are not allowed to derail these and
other key reforms that will help to create more jobs in this country.
Next week Ambassador Butler will attend a meeting in Sarajevo with
representatives of the BiH Employers’ Organisation, the Bulldozer committees and
the trades union to explore ways in which people in these sectors can have a
more consistent and productive voice in policymaking.
