Skopje, 21 December 2021 (MIA) – Prime Minister Zoran Zaev and Deputy Agriculture Minister Trajan Dimkovski took part Tuesday in a forum on agriculture and regional cooperation as part of the Open Balkan Summit in Tirana, the government said. The initiative, said Zaev, is also aimed at improving regional agriculture cooperation between the three Open Balkan countries, North Macedonia, Albania and Serbia. “The Tirana meeting has already produced concrete results that create conditions allowing the cooperation in these areas get a dynamic thanks to the agreements and memorandums we signed,” he stated. Agriculture and the food industry, the PM noted, is one of the key industries in the Western Balkans in terms of industrial production, trade scope, and job creation. “Agriculture plays a key role in the Western Balkans’ overall economy. As a primary sector, its participation is 12 percent of the total GDP of the region. EU’s average is 1.56 percent of the total GDP. It is evident that agriculture is one of the main generators of growth in the region,” PM Zaev said. According to him, rise in trade exchange requires the countries to cooperate with each other and work together on improving standards. “Facilitating administration and customs formalities for free flow of goods is one of the key aspects for the economy to grow. Which is why we focused on these issues to simplify procedures and reduce waiting times at borders,” PM Zaev told the Open Balkan forum in Tirana.