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Albania, Bosnia and Montenegro with the highest dependence on food imports in Europe

Politiko 2025-05-05 13:05:31

Albania, Bosnia and Montenegro with the highest dependence on food imports in

Food accounts for a large share of imports in Montenegro, Bosnia, and Albania compared to other European countries, according to World Bank data for 2023. In Montenegro, food accounted for 24 percent of total imports in 2023, in Bosnia 16.3%, and in Albania 16.1%.

On the other hand, it can be seen that Serbia has the lowest share of food imports in relation to total imports with only 5.8% in 2023, followed by Slovenia with 6.2%, the Czech Republic with 6.3, the Slovak Republic with 6.5% and Turkey with 6.8%.

Montenegro and Bosnia are known for their vast areas of bush, making it impossible to grow food, while Albania has enough land to produce food for its inhabitants, but a large part of the arable land has been converted into grassland.

This high dependence on food imports makes our country more vulnerable to international crises such as wars, rising transport prices or climate change that affect global production. Our country has considerable agricultural potential, but it needs to increase investments in this sector to reduce the trade deficit.

International financial institutions recommend that in order to reduce dependence on food imports, investments are needed, especially in the modernization of agriculture through technology and infrastructure improvements. Supportive policies for domestic producers are suggested, such as subsidies, soft loans, and training for farmers to increase production and quality, and a wider diversification of the products produced.

Internal data from INSTAT shows that agriculture fell for the fourth consecutive year in 2024. Agricultural production fell by -1.1% last year from -1.8 in 2023. The agricultural sector employed 32.2 percent of the total workforce. Since 2019, agriculture's contribution to employment has declined by 4 percentage points.

More detailed data show that agriculture is on a downward trajectory, mainly due to negative developments in family farms and the sharp decline in the livestock sector. In the last decade, the number of animals for milk and meat has almost halved due to the bankruptcy of small farms.

The decline in the rural population and its aging have led to the extinction of small family farms with livestock. For the same reasons, agricultural production in the field has also declined. Family farms for self-consumption are in constant bankruptcy due to the decline and aging of the rural population.

Agricultural production is being organized in the form of businesses with greenhouses for export. Due to this transition, farmers who produced for self-consumption have now become consumers, driving the growth of imports of agricultural products from abroad./ Monitor

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