As part of domestic policy and support for the business environment in Slovakia, we need the number of potential exporters to grow significantly
State Secretary of the Ministry of Foreign and European Affairs Rastislav Chovanec wants to double the number of major Slovak exporters in four years. In an interview, he talks about how the ministry plans to achieve this and what help exporters can expect from the government or other state organisations.
The new Slovak government has been talking about supporting economic diplomacy since its inception. Is this really one of its priorities?
It certainly is, because there are a number of areas within foreign policy that the state should be concerned about or assist in. Economic diplomacy is one of them. We are a small market and it is therefore vitally important for us to be able to look for export territories and new markets for our companies. That is where economic diplomacy is supposed to be helpful. The Slovak economy is one of the most open in the European Union. Of course, the bulk of exports are made up of foreign investors, or companies with foreign capital that manufacture in our country. However, as part of the stability of the economy, we also need to support Slovak companies and Slovak producers so that they can establish themselves abroad.
How do you perceive the development of economic diplomacy in recent years? It does not seem to have been a priority of previous governments.
I have the impression that in the past the word diplomacy was more emphasised in the phrase economic diplomacy. Our current intention is to put more emphasis on the word economic. So that meetings and presentations result in finding a business partner, signing a contract. That is to say, the measures that we apply should also lead to more Slovak exporters at the end of the day, so that the value of exports from Slovakia grows, so that we are able to help more companies to establish themselves on foreign markets.
When we compare this with the Czech Republic or Hungary, Slovakia has been lagging behind in this activity. Why?
First of all, it has to be said objectively that we are starting from a different number of exporters. Hungary, the Czech Republic and Poland have significantly more manufacturing and innovative companies that can export. Now we are talking about firms with domestic capital, because foreign branches of multinational corporations do not usually need state assistance. That is why we also want to focus on companies with a Slovak ownership structure or management that has the right to make decisions on where it wants to locate its production. It is not entirely easy to enter a new market. Sometimes you need to go to a given country for a year or two, look for a partner, apply for tenders, try to establish yourself. There are not many Slovak companies that have the capacity to do that. Now I am not talking about the smaller ones, which quite naturally try to offer their products in neighbouring countries. We are talking about exporters who export at least half a million euros a year.
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