TIRANA, Dec. 20 – Albania and Macedonia have unveiled plans to upgrade road and rail infrastructure in a bid to ease the flow of goods, people and capital between the two neighboring countries.
The commitment came in the first joint meeting the two governments recently held in Pogradec, a lake town in southeastern Albania, next to Ohrid Lake, shared by both countries with the Macedonia part already a UNESCO World Heritage site and Albania stepping up efforts to get protection for its part of the lake.
The completion of the Arbri Road and its extension on the Macedonian side, a joint customs point so that Macedonia can have easier access to Durres port, a railway link between the cross-border Lin village and Macedonia’s Ohrid town and the EU-funded electricity interconnector were some of the joints projects Prime Minister Edi Rama and his Macedonian counterpart Zoran Zaev vowed to implement.
The projects are part of the EU-backed regional economic zone Western Balkan countries have committed to as part of their EU integration under the Berlin Process.
The Arbri Road linking Tirana to Macedonia which Albania plans to complete in the next four years under an ambitious €250 million public-private partnership is the most important project that could step up trade, investment and tourism flows between the two countries.
Prime Minister Edi Rama said he had received guarantees by Zaev that his government will work to carry out a feasibility study on completing its part of the Arbri Road and that Macedonia also considers its extension key to the future and “a vital linking bridge not only physically, but also spiritually.”
“We are very interested in walking together to improve standards serving the flow of goods, people and capital. In this respect, considering the upward trend in trade volumes and tourist flow from Macedonia in the past few years, we will work intensively to have the first one-stop-shop model between our two countries which means the first joint customs and border crossing point in Qafe Thane,” said Prime Minister Rama.
Zoran Zaev said Macedonia was very interested in advancing the Arbri Road project on its side of the border following a feasibility study over its environmental impact on the Mavrovo national park.
“There is huge interest that we also continue the construction of this important axis to ease communication and cooperation opportunities among citizens of both countries,” Zaev said.
Ethnic Albanians account for more than a quarter of Macedonia’s 2 million population while a small Macedonian minority is also present in Albania, concentrated around the Albanian part of the Lake Ohrid at the Pustec Municipality.
While ethnic tensions have been quite constant between the majority Macedonians and the Albanian community there even after a 2001 peace deal, Macedonia’s government recent legal initiative to extend the official use of the Albanian language nationwide is seen as a positive step to normalize the situation.
Macedonians, mostly ethnic Albanians, are the second largest tourists to Albania, with a key contribution to the Albanians economy while more and more Macedonian businesses are using Durres port to handle trade exchanges.
The two countries have also obtained EU-funding to build an electricity interconnector, a €70 mln project expected to complete by 2020.
The stock of Macedonian foreign investment to Albania rose to €40 million in early 2016, double compared to 2014, while trade exchanges between the two countries are at about 14 billion lek (€105 mln), accounting for 1.7 percent of Albania’s trade volume, according to INSTAT and central bank data.
Albanian exports to Macedonia are led by minerals, metals and fresh vegetables and are slightly lower compared to imports from the neighboring country.
Trade exchanges between the two countries are in general smooth, but Albanian vegetable and meat exporters often complain over blockades on Albanian exports in alleged protectionist measures intended to favor Macedonian producers over competition from Albania even though both countries are part of the Central European Free Trade Agreement, CEFTA.
The two government plan to hold a second joint meeting in the first half of 2018.
Macedonia is the second neighbor Albania has held joint government meetings with after four meetings with the Kosovo government in the past four years.
An EU candidate since 2005, Macedonia’s road to Euro-Atlantic integration has been hampered by its name dispute with Greece.
