Brnabic: Serbia to continue to develop economic cooperation with Estonia, especially in ICT sector

TALLINN - Serbian Parliament Speaker Ana Brnabic said on Friday in Tallinn Serbia would continue to develop economic cooperation with Estonia, especially in the ICT sector.

Brnabic, who is on a two-day visit to Estonia, said the ICT sector was the fastest-growing sector of the Serbian economy, and added that the fact the Estonian e-Governance Academy had set up its regional office in Belgrade was an acknowledgement to Serbia and all its capacities, especially in technology.

"Like we had the political part yesterday, today is the part that is more about business and technical cooperation between Estonia and Serbia," said Brnabic, who also visited the Estonian company Nortal, which has opened offices in Serbia.

She said its offices in Belgrade and Novi Sad employed 130 engineers and IT professionals.

"I also wanted to hear their experiences with working in Serbia, to thank them for investing in Serbia, and also to see how we can work further and how they can expand their team in Serbia. So, that is an example of an Estonian investment in the Republic of Serbia," Brnabic said.

She said her first meeting of the day had been a discussion with representatives of the Estonian e-Governance Academy.

"Interestingly, they, too, have an office in Belgrade. So, they, too, have a presence in Belgrade, it is a regional office for the Western Balkans, and they are working from Belgrade," Brnabic said.

She said the Estonian side was pleased Nortal - one of the country's top AI development stakeholders - had operations in Serbia.

Brnabic said her meetings had also addressed potential implementation of Estonia's experiences in cyber security, and noted that the Estonian e-Governance Academy was carrying out an EU-funded cyber security project for the Western Balkans from its regional office in Belgrade.

"We are now setting up our national cyber security centre in Kragujevac as part of the State Date Centre, and we discussed cooperation in that area, because they (Estonia) are one of the global leaders. At the end of the day, the NATO cyber security centre, too, is here in Tallinn, so we will be working on that," she said.