Today, has started a two-day workshop organized by the Ministry of Trade and Industry, respectively by the Kosovo Investment and Enterprise Support Agency (KIESA), which aims to inform, promote and provide relevant information to potential beneficiaries in relation to the EU’s Competitiveness Program for Small and Medium-sized Enterprises in the EU / COSME fund.
The minister of Trade and Industry, Bajram Hasani, at the opening of this workshop, stressed that this is a good opportunity for businesses to access these funds and increase their working capacities and jobs creation.
Hasani has said that the Government of Kosovo has obligations arising from the membership in this fund, which according to him, the neighboring countries were not been able to benefit from it.
"We have signed the COSME Program at the end of December 2017. This program carries the expenses for the Government of Kosovo since we have contributed in this membership, and the program is up to 2020, and I believe we should be very careful about using this fund by our companies due to the fact that there was concern on the best use of it.
Neighboring countries that are members has failed to benefit from it, since their companies were not able to come up with a convincing business plan”, said minister Hasani.
Minister Hasani said that he is optimist that Kosovar companies will benefit from this fund, adding that they will be able to provide additional information as well.
"I strongly believe that Kosovo will benefit from these funds, but we will always supports you. I believe that KIESA will be very cooperative and for any of you questions I ask you to contact this agency. For any additional information about the use of the fund, we are in your disposal since we are very interested to benefit Kosovo”, said Hasani
Further, he pointed out that the Kosovo Government for the membership has contributed 450 thousand euros, and due to this we have to do the best use of it.
Minister Hasani also said that he will allocate a fund for the companies to inform them and have an easy preparation process.
"For the next three years, to the Government of Kosovo the membership it will cost € 450,000, and having a picture from the neighboring countries I would not like to waist the fund, but our companies to use it. Maybe companies of neighboring countries had lack of information, procedures have affected, and due to those reasons we will allocate a special funds to prepare or inform our companies,” he said.
COSME is the EU program whose purpose is to improve the competitiveness of small and medium-sized enterprises in the EU and SMEs in third countries participating in this program.
COSME with a budget of 2.3 billion euros aims at improving access to finance, accessing markets, improving the legal and administrative framework conditions for SME competitiveness and promoting entrepreneurship.