Evaluation of the USAID-Kosovo SME and Agriculture - Economic ...

Development Associates, Inc.provide General Business Services in the Serb minority areas. The implied goal was to contributeto the economic recovery and development of those areas by assisting the local businesscommunities to expand their business and create jobs. It was also hoped that this would createnew business opportunities and facilitate the process of reintegration of the Serb minority.Several Evaluation Team visits were paid to Zvecan office clients and held with the local SerbRMs. The office seems to have been very active and their work has definitely contributed to theachievement of the original and modified objectives.As an example, DTS Kondi is a small, Kosovar Serbian candy manufacturer, located in thevillage of Gracanica. They produce jelly and Turkish delight. They were able to organize thisproduction with KBS support. Further they had the chance to participate in several B2B andtrade fairs, and as a result they currently do approximately 50% of their sales from linkages madeduring these events. During the Belgrade Trade Fair, they established contact with a wholesalerfrom the Czech Republic and had a preliminary agreement for the export of 30 tons ofproducts/month. Unfortunately this was well above their capacity and as the company could notobtain additional financing at that point of time, this excellent opportunity was missed. They didnot give up though. Currently, again with KBS support, they are trying to expand their sales inKosovo and are also pursuing an expansion of their business through the addition of pralineproduction.As a major achievement, it is possible to identify the beginning of an attitude change among theZvecan office clients. Many of them are now keen to link their businesses to the rest of theKosovar business community. The Zvecan office, with the support of the rest of KBS, hassuccessfully assisted their clients in establishing inter-ethnic linkages with companies from therest of Kosovo. To date there are 16 such linkages reported with a total of 138,000 Euro in tradeagreements, mainly as a result of several inter-ethnic B2B events organized by KBS. In additionthe Zvecan office has been very successful in helping local construction companies take part indonor and PISG financed tenders and has provided much needed advice and linkages to therelevant institutions.An example is Kamilija, a construction company from Leposavic, which has received Zvecanoffice support in obtaining much needed financing for road construction equipment, attended theNurnberg Fair with KBS support, identified a potential supplier, negotiated and structured thetransaction. As a result the company increased its capacity and is currently bidding for PISGfunded road maintenance contracts.The activities of the Zvecan office, although not included as an objective in the orginal TaskOrder, have been very much needed, well targeted and fully consistent with USAID’s strategicobjectives for both 2001-2003 and 2004-2008. It would seem prudent to continue some mannerof interethnic business linkage program in the future.5. Main strengths and weaknesses of the projectStrengthsTimely – KBS started to address crucial business needs, at a point in time when other donorswere concentrated only on reconstruction. This was one of the few projects in economicEvaluation of the USAID/Kosovo SME 11 May 2004and Agriculture/Agribusiness ProgramsVolume I