Western Balkans 6 Chamber Investment Forum (WB6 CIF) is a joint initiative of chambers of commerce and industry from Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, North Macedonia, Montenegro and Serbia, that established a platform of cooperation in 2017 with the aim to provide a joint voice to the business community in the region and to facilitate inter-business contacts and promote the region as one investment destination.
WB6 CIF represents around 350,000 companies, mostly small and medium-sized enterprises in its mission to open new opportunities for stronger networking of business communities within the region by removing the remaining obstacles to the development of the regional economic cooperation and improving business and investment climate in the markets of the WB region. WB6 CIF is the business community’s response to political processes in the region, which take place within the Berlin process as an additional incentive of the Western Balkans to join the EU.
Regional economic integration and cooperation has become one of the key tools for contributing to the economic dimension of the Western Balkans region’s integration into the EU, for releasing new potential for economic growth and for underpinning political cooperation in the region. The Berlin Process has so far produced ambitious agendas aimed at enhancing connectivity among people and businesses in the region and with the EU. Further to that, the governments in the region with the support of the EU institutions have committed themselves to further deepening economic integration by removing obstacles to free movement of goods, services, people and capital.
The WB6 business community strongly supports the initiative that the Western Balkans become a more economically integrated region. The WB6 CIF as the representative of the business community is actively advocating for free movement of goods/services throughout the region to cut costs and make our goods and services more competitive on the global market, actively promoting this Region as a single investment destination.
Western Balkans 6 Chamber Investment Forum
In early 2017, chambers of commerce and industry from the Western Balkans 6 (Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, North Macedonia, Montenegro and Serbia) decided to establish the WB6 CIF, as a professional association of chambers headquartered in Trieste, Italy. Its inauguration was held on 12 July 2017.
The Multiannual Action Plan for a Regional Economic Area in the Western Balkans 6 (MAP REA) adopted by Prime Ministers of the WB6 at the Summit in Trieste singles out the WB6 CIF and its prominent role in the continuous and interactive dialogue with the private sector, which is one of the key commitments of the region in delivering the Regional Economic Area in the context of the Berlin process.
The Permanent Secretariat is the first tool CIF has created to further articulate the voice of regional business community.
