Breaking the Barriers to Services Trade in Central and Eastern Europe

Jasna Tonovska – Faculty of Economics – Skopje, Ss. Cyril and Methodius University in Skopje, Bul. Goce Delcev 9V, 1000 Skopje, Republic of North Macedonia

Abstract: Rapid technological advancements have caused profound shifts in the global economy, establishing services and their trade as pivotal com­ponents within the framework of economic transformation. The study inves­tigates developments in international trade in services within five CEE coun­tries over the last two decades, using various data sources – the Balance of Payments (BOP), the overall and the digital services trade restrictiveness in­dex (STRI) and trade in value added. Despite CEE countries being net-export­ers of services, the share of services in total external trade remains limited. Also, several ‘modern services’ exhibit an increase in their exports and services supplied internationally through mode 3 are substantial. As reflected in the modest share of services exports in GDP, services in CEE exhibit low tradability. Both STRI and Digital STRI data suggest that services sectors in CEE have open regulatory environment for trade. The findings highlight the importance of prioritizing digitalization and leveraging technological advancements to en­hance services trade and foster economic growth in the CEE region.

7th International Scientific Conference on Recent Advances in Information Technology, Tourism, Economics, Management and Agriculture – ITEMA 2023 – Conference Proceedings, Hybrid (Faculty of Organization and Informatics Varaždin, University of Zagreb, Croatia), October 26, 2023

ITEMA Conference Proceedings published by: Association of Economists and Managers of the Balkans – Belgrade, Serbia

ITEMA conference partners: Faculty of Economics and Business, University of Maribor, Slovenia; Faculty of Organization and Informatics, University of Zagreb, Varaždin; Faculty of Geography, University of Belgrade, Serbia; Institute of Marketing, Poznan University of Economics and Business, Poland; Faculty of Agriculture, Banat’s University of Agricultural Sciences and Veterinary Medicine ”King Michael I of Romania”, Romania

ITEMA Conference 2023 Conference Proceedings: ISBN 978-86-80194-75-2, ISSN 2683-5991, DOI: https://doi.org/10.31410/ITEMA.2023

Creative Commons Non Commercial CC BY-NC: This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-Non-Commercial 4.0 License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/) which permits non-commercial use, reproduction and distribution of the work without further permission.

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