Ziga: 29 Investment Projects Worth €930 mn Brought to Slovakia in 2016

Bratislava, January 2 (TASR) – Last year saw Slovakia recording its best results in five years in terms of the number of new jobs and their composition, and it appears that its stable and predictable business environment and legislation make Slovakia an attractive country for foreign investors, Economy Minister Peter Ziga (Smer-SD) has told TASR when looking in retrospect at 2016.

“Based on available data at the ministry or at SARIO [the Slovak Investment and Trade Development Agency], we drew in 29 [investment] projects worth €930 million to Slovakia in 2016, which created 7,500 jobs,” said Ziga.

It is no longer the case that Slovakia is an ‘assembly hall’, given the character of the investments. “They also involve investments in research and development. We’ve agreed on two research and development centres and we’ve begun to support business services centres, for which four projects have been concluded,” said Ziga.

All the investments create opportunities for exports and aren’t located only in western, but also in central and eastern Slovakia. “The Government is committed to supporting the least-developed regions. This is why we’ve adopted legislation to this effect and held 12 ‘away’ Government sessions in such regions,” said Ziga.

The Cabinet is also planning to improve the business environment in the long haul, he added. “We’d like to assess the impact of legislation adopted on small and medium-sized enterprises.

We managed to adopt a law on small and medium-sized enterprises in 2016 that should help to remove red tape and improve the business environment,” said the minister.