REGIONAL COOPERATION AND ECONOMIC INTEGRATION

CEFTA-2006 TRADE COOPERATION
1. Significance and contribution of CEFTA-2006
CEFTA is a multilateral agreement of the Western Balkan Countries and Moldova, with
the primary aim to provide liberalization of the foreign trade regime within the region, by
consolidation of all former bilateral agreements signed among them. Complete introduction
of a zone of free trade, according to CEFTA 2006 should be realized until 31.12.2010.
Apart of the primary goal, the intention of CEFTA 2006 agreement was to encourage
regional integration and cooperation among countries of South Eastern Europe during
process of development and fulfillment of political, security and legal criteria for their
forthcoming integration into the European Union. CEFTA 2006 is more comprehensive
than the original CEFTA and the rest of the bilateral FTAs, covering bigger number of
areas,that till CEFTA 2006 was not subject of negotiations.
Namely, beside trade of goods liberalization, for the first time this agreement anticipates
the possibility of liberalization of trade in services, public purchases, investment and
intellectual property rights protection. Extended areas of cooperation should create sound
fundamentals for increasing of opportunities for economic cooperation among countries
in the region, as well as fostering of the harmonization processes of their measures and
the international standards. New CEFTA agreement foresees that member states should
recognize the WTO agreement concerning the technical barriers to trade, undertaking
the obligations to harmonize the national technical standards with the WTO regulations
and those of EU, latest till 31.12.2010. (Draft of the Agreement on Modification of and
Accession to the Central European Free Trade Area Agreement, Bucharest, 6 th of April
2006, p.10)
Member states are obliged to facilitate the tariff procedures and formalities and to provide
fast flow of goods, whereas important role goes on the reform of rules for origin of goods.
(Draft of the Agreement on Modification of and Accession to the Central European Free
Trade Area Agreement, Bucharest, 6 th of April 2006, p.11)
As said above, establishment of functional free trade area is a priority goal of CEFTA
2006. The liberalization process started in May 2007 has different intensity for both
groups of products: industrial and agricultural. Concerning industrial goods’ exchange,
dismantling of tariff expenditures and their equivalent measures were realized for bigger
number industrial goods right after agreement entered in force. For a small number of
goods listed in Annex 2 of the Agreement, in the bilateral trade between some members,
tariffs continued to be applied with the noted decrease, according to defined time schedule.
(
Annex 2 of the Agreement for Modification and Accession to CEFTA, Article 8, Official
Journal of the Republic of Macedonia, No. 59/06)
Including 31.12.2008, tariffs were totally annulated for all industrial goods traded among
member states of CEFTA 2006.
Regarding the trade in agricultural goods, the Agreement foresees step by step tariff
decrease till their entire annulations, having on mind that all countries negotiate among
them on bilateral regime for import and export of agricultural goods. (Annex 3 of the
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