Prospective analysis of the SME sector of the Western Balkans

The article offers an original perspective on the impacts of multilateral cooperation for the development of the private sector in complex economic environments. It examines the financial instruments deployed by several financing institutions in support of EU pre-accession policies for the six countries of the Western Balkans during the period 2014-2020 through a platform of cooperation for SMEs and the private sector called Enterprise Development and Innovation Facility (EDIF). It is based on research that aimed at evaluating the needs for external financial support to the region for the period 2021-2027. The core party of the study analyses a so far unexploited database comprising the financial accounts of all Serbian companies over the period 2009-18. The database documented the high dispersion and strong asymmetry in the distribution of the financial results of the private sector in Serbia, which is typical of a situation of high risk and uncertainty that prevails also in many other countries outside the European Union.