ZAGREB, September 22, 2020 - The Dubrovnik-based Improtanne Resort hotel company was given two Financial Agency (FINA) Golden Balance awards on Tuesday - for the most financially successful business according to financial ratings and for the most successful business in the hospitality sector in 2019.

Since 2008, FINA has been giving the annual awards to best businesses in several fields according the criteria of their profitability, liquidity, debts, activities and cost efficiency.

Of the 136,260 businesses which submitted financial statements, FINA shortlisted 2.9%, or 4,008 businesses: 178 micro-enterprises, 2,582 small enterprise, 1,005 medium-sized enterprises and 243 big companies. 

For instance, the Rijeka-based Ugor company won this year's award for the most successful enterprise in the sector of agriculture, forestry and fisheries, the Orahovica-based Radlovac was the winner in mining, Jadranska Vrata from Rijeka in transport and logistics, H&M in trade, the Cepin-based Iver was the most successful business in construction, Zagrebinspekt in the sector of expert, scientific and technical activities.

This year, the award-giving ceremony was held for the first time in a digital form. Addressing this event online, Finance Minister Zdravko Maric recalled that 2019 would be remembered as a year with great achievements of Croatian entrepreneurs.

However, the coronavirus pandemic in 2020 has imposed new challenges on all of us, he admitted.

Since the start of the crisis, Croatia's government has been managing the situation in a timely and appropriate manner, the minister said.

So far, seven billion kuna has been granted under the schemes aimed at the support to wages and job retention, he added.

FINA management board chair: 2019 with record results for Croatia's economy

The FINA management board president Drazen Covic said that 2019 was a year with record results for doing business in Croatia.

"In terms of the total revenues, Croatia's economy rose by more than 10%," Covic said.

The profit of businesses increased by six percent, and investments in non-material and material assets strongly grew, by 15%, and exports increased by more than six percent, he said.

Since 2020 FINA has been monitoring the trends in employment, and last year, entrepreneurs employed a record high number, nearly 970,000 workers, Covic said.

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ZAGREB, Sept 2, 2020 - Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Zdravko Maric said on Wednesday after an inner cabinet meeting that keeping jobs is a priority and that support measures for sectors affected by the coronavirus crisis, such as hospitality and transport, will be made known in the next few days.

Maric made the statement while responding to reporters' questions about the continuation of measures for the hospitality sector, which Tourism and Sports Minister Nikolina Brnjac had announced earlier, saying that they were on the table and being taken care of.

He said that internal consultations were ongoing and recalled that the government had generously financed support for the economy, however, he noted that everything has its fiscal repercussions and fiscal possibilities.

"This year the budget result is not a priority, however, in these circumstances it is necessary to find funds and ensure budget sustainability for this year and the years to come," said Maric.

Keeping jobs is a priority, he said, recalling that the government had presented a shorter working week and that the recently approved SURE program would provide a little more than €1 million in loans for Croatia.

Intensive talks are underway regarding the generous envelope that is part of Europe's recovery plan, Maric said, adding that testing was already underway regarding the use of support in hospitality.

Maric added that he understands the problems faced by the occasional transport sector whose representatives earlier in the day handed out leaflets to lawmakers listing their problems.

We have embarked on horizontal measures and have continued to support tourism and transport and everything will be made known in the next few days, he said. 

Our priority is to keep jobs and we are willing and ready to do the best we can, he added.

Maric explained that there had not been any money in the budget for the first round of support either, however, the money was eventually found and efforts would be made to continue to preserve jobs.

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ZAGREB, Sept 2, 2020- Tourism and Sports Minister Nikolina Brnjac said on Wednesday that all options for helping the hospitality and tourism sector were "on the table", recalling that restaurant and bar owners were the first to receive help from the state when the corona crisis started.

We talked with the entire hospitality and tourism sector about how to continue with the measures, all options are now still on the table, said Brnjac in front of the government building while answering reporters' questions about the continuation of aid and whether the state has the funds to help restaurant and bar owners requesting it because they are facing bankruptcy and liquidation.

Asked about the continuation of measures for the hospitality and tourism sector in terms of the recent statement by Finance Minister Zdravko Maric that aid must come to an end one day, Brnjac reiterated that all of them were being taken care of and that possibilities for the continuation of the aid were discussed at meetings every day.

She recalled that through the recovery and resilience facility guidelines would define which funds would be in the forms of grants and which in the form of loans. "That will be the source of most funding," she underscored.

Asked whether that meant it was possible that the state would continue financing the hospitality sector, she underlined that "we have to have all options before us," that the hospitality sector had been the first to get help from the state, and that viability had to be taken into account. She underscored the importance of preserving jobs.

Asked about aid for transport operators working on an occasional basis, who on Wednesday demonstrated outside the government calling for urgent aid because the corona crisis has left them with almost no income and numerous jobs are in danger, Minister Brnjac confirmed that transport operators, as well as travel agencies, had seen a slump in turnover, which is why representatives of agencies had been to the Ministry last week.

"We have also discussed with employees from other ministries about how to help them and provide measures for business viability," she added.

"It is important for us that the season continues in September because the situation is not the same in entire Croatia, and the promotional campaign will be adjusted to that," the minister noted.

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ZAGREB, Aug 17, 2020 - Since the epidemiological situation has deteriorated and some hospitality venues are violating measures by the national COVID-19 response team, the response team for Split on Monday called for precise conditions and epidemiological measures as they are being interpreted differently on the ground.

Representatives of the Split Civil Protection Authority and city officials called on the county and national authorities to specify the conditions and epidemiological measures that hospitality and services venues need to adhere to due to the different interpretations and violations of measures on the ground, particularly with regard to working hours for bars, night clubs, and restaurants.

They called on the competent services and inspections to intensify controls and the implementation of the recommended measures due to frequent breaches.

The city's response team called on citizens and guests, particularly young people, to behave responsibly and in line with epidemiological measures that are intended to protect their health and that of others.

The team called on workers in tourism, particularly hospitality providers, to implement the recommended measures thus protecting health, allowing the economy and tourism to function and saving jobs.

ZAGREB, Aug 14, 2020 - The national association of hospitality providers on Friday called for compliance with the latest measures and recommendations by the Civil Protection Authority related to bars, but considers that they are unfair to those who have adhered to the measures all the time.

The national COVID response team on Thursday adopted a decision whereby hospitality venues described as 'bars', which refers to night clubs, night bars, disco-bars, cafe bars and the like, will not be allowed to be open after midnight. The measure will remain in force as of today and for the next ten days.

Ahead of the coming public holiday weekend, the association of hospitality providers called on everyone in the hospitality sector to, as always until now, comply with all the measures and recommendations by epidemiological services and the civil protection authority.

However, coming to terms with the epidemiological reality, the association warns that that decision was adopted without considering the specific features of hospitality and the broad definition of the variety of enterprises that are considered to be bars.

"It is unfair that hospitality venues that have until now operated in accordance with all the recommended measures, and entire regions without a rise in new cases of the infection such as Istria and the Kvarner archipelago, to be penalised due to the negligence of some individual clubs. We object to limiting working hours, seeing that bars encompass too broad a number of hospitality venues, from peaceful cafe bars on the beach in Istria to the biggest clubs in the Adriatic. Our proposal is that each club and other venues identified as hotspots (of the infection)  to be immediately closed temporarily for 14 days and that their employees be tested," Marin Medak said on behalf of the association.

The association called for more frequent inspections and penalties for those venues that do not adhere to epidemiological measures, as they are causing damage to public health and to all those businesses that are operating in consistence with the authority's measures.

As Morski writes on the 25th of March, 2019, the specialised portal Gastroposao, which was launched last year, and the City of Pula are continuing their cooperation this year, too.

The portal's aim is to tackle the problem of the lack of quality seasonal workers in hospitality and tourism, which is one of the biggest problems Croatian tourism has faced in recent years.

Following the good results of last year's pilot cooperation between the Gastroposao portal and the City of Pula, when during May and June, Pula's small and medium entrepreneurs in the fields of hospitality and tourism were greatly helped in terms of finding a quality workforce, this year the project is also including Istria, Rovinj and Medulin, as well as the town of Novalja on the island of Pag.

The City of Pula is the first city to recognise the need to create much more simple and exact measures of employment assistance in the field of hospitality and tourism, and has decided that all restaurants from the City of Pula can use incentives in the amount of 90 percent to finance their search for a quality workforce by announcing their search on Gastroposao.

''We're witnessing just how challenging it is to find a quality workforce today, especially in tourism. The tourist season is knocking at the front door and our intention is to quickly and easily "connect" the supply and demand on the labour market and this is why this project is important. If we continue to want to develop and make steps with our [tourist] offer, then it's crucial to have a high-quality workforce,'' said Pula's mayor, Boris Miletić.

Pula will provide direct assistance to all those in the tourism and hospitality sector before the tourist season kicks off, allowing them to easily and quickly find high quality seasonal workers from all over Croatia and beyond, without having to pay extra cash, and with minimal amounts of paperwork.

This means that those looking for staff only pay 100 kuna in costs when publishing an ad on Gastroposao, while the rest will be subsidised by their local government. This approach helps those in the hospitality and tourism industry because a great many small and medium-sized businesses are struggling to be able to get hold of the necessary resources needed for such moves otherwise. The only condition they must fulfil is that they are beneficiaries of measures in the areas of the cities of Pula, Rovinj and Novalja, or in the municipality of Medulin.

It's important to mention that Gastroposao cuts out the middle man and allows employer and employee to communicate directly to each other without any third parties. Employees don't need to write out any job applications and resumes, and they only need to fill in a prepared questionnaire on the Gastroposao portal which has been tailored to the professional terms and written language rules that chefs, waiters and other employees in such fields understand.

Otherwise, the Gastroposao project is co-funded under the IPA Local Employment Promotion Initiative - phase II of the European Social Fund, in the amount of 178,938.00 euro. Gastroposao is the only specialist portal in the Republic of Croatia for employment assistance in the tourism and hospitality sector.

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