ZAGREB, May 12, 2018 - Portugal is one of the few countries to which Croatia exports more than it imports from, heard a Portuguese-Croatia economic forum held on Friday in Lisbon, where about a hundred Croatian and Portuguese business people met to discuss mutual cooperation and possible joint ventures in former Portuguese colonies. The economic forum was held during a state visit by President Kolinda Grabar-Kitarović to the country on the Iberian Peninsula.
"Croatia and Portugal have excellent political relations and the aim of this visit is for that excellent cooperation to be copied in our economies. Considering a low volume of trade of just over 85 million euro, the direction we have to go in is up and that is why we are here today," the president of the Croatian Chamber of Commerce (HGK) Luka Burilović said.
In 2017, trade with Portugal amounted to 85.3 million euro which is a 14% increase compared to 2016, HGK data shows. Croatia exported products valued at 57.9 million euro and imported 27.4 million euro worth goods. Croatia mostly exports leather products, socks, medicines and rubber and plastic manufacturing machines while it imports raw paper and cardboard, tyres and pork.
"Economic relations between our two countries aren't developed sufficiently. However, there is potential for us to be complimentary, to mutually complement each other and collaborate on third markets. For example, Portugal can be Croatia's gateway toward Portuguese speaking countries while Croatia can be Portugal's gateway to Southeast Europe," President Grabar-Kitarović said addressing the forum.
