ICMA's involvement in Serbia dates to the year 2000, when the Serbian municipalities of Pancevo, Kragujevac, Subotica, and Nis were partnered with four U.S. jurisdictions in the ICMA CityLinks program (known then as Resource Cities). The partners worked together to help the Serbian cities improve service delivery, particularly in the areas of water, wastewater, and solid waste management; promote local economic development; and create public-private partnerships. (See descriptions under "Projects in this Country" at right.)
Most recently (2005-2010), ICMA worked with The Urban Institute (UI) to implement the Municipal Economic Growth Activity (MEGA) program in Serbia. The project, funded by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), was designed to promote local economic development through technical assistance to ten selected Serbian municipalities. The cities included in the first round of MEGA were Indjija, Kragujevac, Krusevac, Loznica, Novi Belgrado, Prokuplje, Subotica, Uzice, Vranje, Zrenjanin.
Each of these cities established a local economic development (LED) office and hired a staff to fill that office. The staff were trained in basic economic development and participated in topical trainings provided by MEGA and economic development professionals from the United States and Serbia. Staff from the LED offices traveled to the U.S. and to the Czech Republic to observe economic development best practices. Each MEGA city was assisted in the creation of strategic plans and the development of work plans for economic development projects.
Project components included:
- Supporting national level policy advocacy that enables local economic development
- Providing assistance and training to towns and municipalities to support economic development in their communities
- Facilitating private-sector growth through the creation of various local facilities such as industrial/science/technology/export/staging/tourism parks, business improvement districts (BIDs) and business incubators
- Building municipal capacity in areas such as strategic planning, formulation and implementation of business regeneration, retention and attraction programs, promotion and marketing, more “investor friendly” processes, and linking businesses to financial institutions.
ICMA delivered training for urban planners, providing them with tools for economic development, participated as a judge in an "Invest in Serbia" competition, and conducted a study tour by Serbian participants to Auburn, Alabama.
In the second part of the program, the municipalities of Pecinci, Sabac, Cacak, Kraljevo, Arilje, Prijepolje, Pancevo, Vrsac, Smederevo, Paracin, and Leskovac were selected to participate through the Foreign and Domestic Investment Promotion project, implemented as part of MEGA with similar program components.
Results included:
- Significant number of new jobs created in targeted municipalities
- Increased direct public and private investment to promote local economic development
- Accelerated increase in the number of new startup businesses
- A greater number of new private/public partnerships.