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Strana ulaganja
Episode · #214

QUO VADIS HRVATSKA Strana ulaganja

Guest Strana ulaganjaMay 3, 2026
About this episode
What you'll hear in this conversation

Croatia often projects an image of stunning natural beauty and sporting prowess, but rarely of a dynamic business destination. The numbers bear this out: despite decades of opportunity, foreign direct investment lags significantly behind regional peers, with much of it concentrated in non-productive sectors like real estate rather than manufacturing. This panel brings together a unique mix of perspectives to uncover why this gap persists and what it means for the country's economic future. Damir Novotny, an economic analyst, begins by dissecting the raw investment data, revealing a less flattering picture than the headline figures suggest. Mladen Fogec, president of the Foreign Investors Association, shares anecdotes from international ambassadors that highlight a profound disconnect between Croatia's actual potential and its global business perception. Stanko Kršlović, a board member at Philip Morris Zagreb, offers the perspective of a foreign entity operating on the ground, challenging common local assumptions about business climate. Together, they explore the overlooked strengths and persistent weaknesses that define operating in Croatia today. This conversation will make you rethink how a country’s brand is built—and lost—on the global stage, and why the most valuable assets for investment are often the ones taken for granted.

Insights from the conversation
What to take from this episode
01
Damir Novotny points out that Croatia's 29.4 billion euros in FDI over 27 years includes "direct foreign investments in the real estate sector, which do not multiply the economic process in the long run." Headline investment numbers can be misleading; real economic growth comes from capital deployed in production, not just asset transfers.
02
Mladen Fogec recounts three ambassadors concluding that Croatia is "a really good and beautiful country for investment, for work, and for life, but that nobody knows this." Even with objective advantages, a country's global business perception is often disconnected from its reality, requiring active, targeted promotion.
03
Fogec paraphrases ambassadors who state their duty is "to care for our investors or our business people for business in Croatia," not to help Croatian businesses invest elsewhere. Expecting foreign embassies to promote your country's outward investment is a misunderstanding; their role is to facilitate *inward* investment from their own nations.
04
Fogec notes the "first shock is for everyone who comes here: 'Everyone speaks English!'" and that "highly educated people are very qualified." A country's most appealing assets for foreign investors—like language skills or a qualified workforce—are often taken for granted internally and remain uncommunicated externally.
05
Kršlović, representing Philip Morris, challenges the notion that bureaucratic hurdles and a poor business climate are unique to Croatia, asking, "Do you really think that doesn't exist in our country?" (referring to the UK). While frustrations with bureaucracy are real, comparing local challenges to an idealized external environment often misses that similar issues exist even in highly developed markets.
06
Kršlović from Philip Morris emphasizes that "people are a very, very important thing," and modern investments are increasingly "in people, above all, in new ideas, in innovations." Even for large corporations, the ultimate driver of investment decisions is shifting from physical infrastructure to human capital and the capacity for new ideas.
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