8–11th September 2009, Croatia and Slovenia

PALGO Center has organized the PPP Study Tour to Slovenia for Central and Local Government and Media Representatives from Serbia from 8th till 11th September 2009, in cooperation with Oikos ltd. from Slovenia.

The participants of the Study Tour were representatives of the central and local authorities, local public utility companies, Serbian Chamber of Commerce, Standing Conference of Towns and Municipalities, NGOs and donor programs dealing with this issue, as well as the journalists from the relevant print and electronic media.

In the course of the visit to Croatia and Slovenia, the Study Tour participants have got themselves acquainted with the practice of introducing private partners in PPP arrangements, with the aim of improving the quality of public services provision and, by that, the life quality of the citizens.
The general goal of the Study Tour was to help the participants understand the idea of introducing PPP arrangements, through getting to know the results achieved and learning from the Slovenian experience. More precisely, the participants had the opportunity to understand the processes leading to PPP arrangements (methods, instruments, procedures, potential impediments) and to have a first-hand experience of the results achieved and benefits gained for the local community.

Study Tour participants were received by Zoran Jankovic, Mayor of the City of Ljubljana. He informed the group about the strategic direction of the development of the system of public services provision in Ljubljana, with the special emphasis on the PPP issue. Mayor Jankovic has talked about the importance of the sport hall and the stadium Stozice, and about the strategic determination not to enter the PPP arrangements in the communal services area in Ljubljana.

In the course of the visit, the participants of the Study Tour have visited the following locations:

1. Arena Zagreb: In this PPP project, the public partner is the City of Zagreb, while the private one is the company Ingra. Public partner invested the ground and private partner provided the financial means for building the hall. The value of the facility is 90 million EUR. The duration of the contract is 27 years. The PPP contract envisages that the City of Zagreb will use the hall for the public, sport and culture events and pay the 7.2 million EUR annual lease to the private partner in the following 20 years. After that period, the City of Zagreb will become the owner of the facility.
2. Regional Landfill Barje: The participants have been received by the Janko Kramzar, General Manager of the Regional Landfill Barje. He informed them about the PUC Snaga and the regional landfill this company is managing. PUC Snaga has 454 employees and deals with the collection, transport and disposal of communal and industrial non-dangerous waste for 330 thousand citizens and companies. Besides, the company is also dealing with: cleaning and washing of the public areas, some construction works and electricity production, from the landfill biogas. The Regional Landfill is not a classical PPP form, as the City of Ljubljana financed its construction from the EU funds.
3. Stadium Stozice: The value of this project is 220 million EUR. The private partner is to build the following facilities: (1) stadium, by the end of 2010, (2) sport hall, by the end of 2010, (3) trade center – shopping mall by 2012, as well as the parking for the stadium and the shopping mall, Skate Park, small playground for recreational purposes, jogging track, etc. The public partner will be the owner of all sport facilities worth 80 million EUR. The private partner gets the trade center, including the ground underneath. The City of Ljubljana is to decide whether it will confer the management of these facilities to the private partner in the public procurement procedure or the City itself will manage the facilities.
4. Technology Park Ljubljana: Technology Park Ljubljana is the center for preparing the innovative ideas and new progressive projects, that will, implemented by the companies, encourage the local economic development and the employment of young experts from various fields from Ljubljana and the whole Slovenia and provide the assistance of the companies, that want to develop fast. The activities of the Technology Park can be divided into three areas: (1) physical infrastructure, such as software construction, etc. (2) standard services provision- financial services, legal affairs, direct performing the work tasks for the companies or consulting, (3) specific services, assisting with founding of the companies with home, foreign and mixed capital, ideas on the business area the company is to deal with, educating the employees, making contacts with the partners, with the aim of making business arrangements, providing cheap services (office space rent), terms for project financing, etc.

Julija Karlovsek from Karlovsek ltd. consultant firm, which deals with the PPP projects in Slovenia, presented to the participants the legal framework for this type of projects in Slovenia: Law on PPP, Law on Public Procurement, Law on Public Services, Law on Financing and other legal acts.

At the end, the participants held a round table and summed up the impressions of the Study Tour and the PPP issue in general. They stated that the Study Tour was very important for them in the professional sense and that PPP should be the strategic direction of the public services development in Serbia.

The participants of the Study Tour will be invited to participate in the forthcoming PALGO Center project, which is dealing with PPP issues (’Improvement of the Public Services Provision through Private Sector Participation’). Based on their professional experience, knowledge gained in Slovenia and in relation with the possible problems and obstacles in the Serbian local government system, the Study Tour participants will work within the newly formed Focus Group, with the task to draft the recommendations for national PPP legislation.

The list of the Study Tour Participants:

1. Renata Pindzo, Assistant Minister for Economics and Regional Development
2. Sinisa Mitrovic, Special Advisor to the Minister for Environment and Spatial Planning
3. Aleksandar Jovanovic, Assistant to the President of the Municipality of Vracar
4. Milos Kovacevic, Member of the Municipal Council of the Municipality of Savski Venac
5. Risto Raco, Member of the Municipal Council of the Municipality of Stari Grad
6. Irina Burka-Parcetic, Chief of the City Administration of the City of Sombor
7. Miodrag Gluscevic, Secretary of the Committee for Communal Sevices and Committee for Energy Efficiency of Standing Conference of Towns and Municipalities
8. Dubravka Poznic, PR Manager of the National Alliance for Local Economic Development (NALED)
9. Ljiljana Stankovic, Senior Expert Associate in the Committee for Environment Protection of the Serbian Chamber of Commerce
10. Bojana Vlahovic, Head of the Department for Legal, General and HR Affairs of the PUC City Markets, City of Belgrade
11. Sasa Jovanovic, Chief of the Department for Inspection Affairs of the Municipality of Pirot
12. Miodrag Gubijan, Chief of the Project Office of the Municipality of Prokuplje
13. Milenko Malesev, Deputy Chief of the Local Economic Development Office of the City of Novi Sad
14. Ljiljana Brdarevic, Capital Investments and PPP Advisor of the MEGA Program (USAID)
15. Stevan Veljovic, Journalist, Ekonomist, weekly magazine
16. Marijana Avakumovic, Journalist, Politika, daily newspaper
17. Aleksandra Galic, Journalist, TV B92
18. Aleksandar Malinovic, Cameraman, TV B92
19. Miomir Laketic, Journalist, Blic Novac magazine
20. Boban Trajkovic, Journalist, Production Group Mreza
21. Dusan Damjanovic, Executive Director of PALGO Center
22. Marija Grujic, Project Coordinator of PALGO Center
23. Nikola Mikasinovic, Project Manager of PALGO Center
24. Radmila Vladisavljevic, PPP Consultant of PALGO Center

The Study Tour was supported by the OSI/LGI from Budapest and the National Alliance for Local Economic Development (NALED) from Belgrade.

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