Dear Friends,
The year 2016 was a year of significant novelties and improvements.
As the event of the year we want to point out the publication of our first independent publication – The Great Rebirth. The publication of the book arose as a result of cooperation with the Peterson Institute form Washington DC. We organized the book promotion in Belgrade in October for our partners, associates and those who support our work, with prominent European reformers – Ivan Mikloš and Simeon Djankov as main speakers. The Great Rebirth found its place on the library shelves of many university schools in Serbia. We are very proud of the fact that many students will have an opportunity to learn about reforms in Europe from our publication.
Beside the cooperation with the Peterson Institute, we have established cooperation with the Fraser Institute from Canada and we became its national partner and a member of the Economic Freedom of the World Network. Our conference Economic Freedom in Serbia attracted the most relevant experts who, as a part of five working groups, got significant suggestion how to improve Serbia’s bad position at the index. As a result of the conference and interviews that we have conducted afterwards, the Serbian 2016 Economic Freedom Country Audit was created and published at the end of the year.
During the election campaign in April, we sent a package of concrete proposals to our politicians, who often avoid talks on this topic. Reasonable austerity measures, relief of private sector, lower taxes on labor and educational reform remain the proposals on which we will continue to insist in the coming year. At the beginning of t2017, we will present our proposal for adequate regulation of the night life industry to the decision makers in the city of Belgrade.
Dealing with topics such as Brexit, Trump, misconceptions about Swedish or Swiss models, this year we started publishing interviews with prominent international experts. This attracted attention of one of the oldest Serbian weekly magazines – NIN, which led to the cooperation and publishing of our interviews in this highest circulation weekly magazine in Serbia.
In the field of education, we have successfully finished the fifth, and then enrolled the sixth generation of outstanding young people who are going to be participants of our Public Policy Academy until June 2017. In cooperation with publishing house Albion Books, we have participated in publication of “The Fountainhead” by Ayn Rand. This important project was accompanied by panel discussion which attracted around 100 people in April.
We often emphasize that the greatest successes of Libek are the successes of the people that we direct to use skills and persistence to discover new opportunities in achieving their goals and plans. With this approach we all contribute together to the birth of prosperity in Serbia.
We are finishing this year proud of our joint achievements and grateful to all those who are supporting the building of a free society of responsible individuals.
Miloš Nikolić,
President of Libek