Chairperson and Deputy Chairperson of the Committee on Economy, Finance and Budget, Mr Aleksandar Damjanović and Mr Damir Šehović met with members of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) mission, headed by Mr Alasdair Scott, Head of Mission for Montenegro.

The IMF mission stays in Montenegro in order to gather current information on the state of economy, outlook and policies in the following period within the annual consultation in accordance with Article IV of the Fund’s Statute.

At the meeting there was discussion on key economic challenges of Montenegro in the following period. They considered issues relating to the current macroeconomic developments, state of the economy, public finance, with focus on public debt and borrowing policy, as well as implementation of structural reforms, primarily in the field of labour market and pension system. In focus of the discussion, there was the issue of sustainability of the highway construction as the key capital project. In addition to that, they also discussed the issue of nonperforming loans (NPL) and the issue of interest rates levels.

Conversations with the IMF representatives are to continue during this and the following week, and on the last day of the visit, 4 November 2014, after the end of the meeting, the public will be presented with conclusions of the mission and their assessment of the economic situation in Montenegro.