An Economic Reform Agenda for Croatia: a comprehensive economic reform package prepared for the Croatian Statehood Foundation

Since the outbreak of the financial crisis Croatia has faced negative growth rates and Foreign Direct Investment has not recovered since. This has resulted in a steadily growing brain drain of highly qualified labor. The economy’s international competitiveness has been decreasing for quite some time, and has now fallen to one of the last positions in the European ranking. Economic analysts and many politicians agree that the country’s development is blocked by not being able to reform. Implementation of the necessary reforms is a precondition for any return to sustainable growth. This collected volume presents a comprehensive economic reform agenda for Croatia. The analyses focus on reform areas such as FDI and exports, exchange rates, labor markets, private debt, public finance, regulations of private enterprise, social security, human capital, technology and innovations, as well as infrastructure, especially energy. The reform concepts presented in each chapter of this volume were discussed in workshops with Croatian academics and stakeholders and condensed into a final comprehensive and feasible reform agenda.