Public-Private Partnership Contracts and Projects and their Infl uence on the Local Economy Development in Serbia

Public-private partnership (PPP) is a relatively new legal institute and financing model in the legal system of the Republic of Serbia, which was created only after the adoption of the Law on Public-Private Partnership and Concessions in 2011. The basic elements of PPP are contracts and projects. When it comes to contracts, the legal nature of the public contract on PPP is still not sufficiently clarified. Although this contract has elements of an administrative contract, it still does not follow from legislation in Serbia. Therefore, in the future, special attention should be paid to harmonizing the regime of this contract with the regime of administrative contracts established in the Law on General Administrative Procedure. On the other hand, after ten years, PPP projects in Serbia are becoming an increasingly important instrument of local economic development. Until July 2022, the Commission for PPP of the Government of the Republic of Serbia gave a positive opinion for 227 public-private partnership projects. We will present why the legal nature of the public contract on PPP is important and how PPP projects encourage local economic development in the Republic of Serbia.