MASIT ICT Chamber of Commerce had a work meeting with the president of the Republic of North Macedonia, Stevo Pendarovski.
On that meeting there were talks of the necessity of creating a technological park, creating of conditions for the young to stay in the country, reviving the economic diplomacy and treating the ICT sector as a strategic branch.
”When we are constantly speaking about Euro integrations and becoming a part of the European Union, with expectation this to happen sooner or in few years, there is the fact that acquiring a degree in ICT field you automatically get an European passport. Let me elaborate – a lot of countries in Europe, even in the world, have very liberal immigration policies when it comes to ICT professionals. The task in front of us is to create socially-economical climate or environment for these professionals, so that they won’t have to leave our country.
We always say that ICT is high value add industry. Let me simulate that in numbers how much exactly: The annual average country income per employee is somewhere around 15 000 Euros as portion of GDP, or for each employed person the country makes 15 000 Euros. Now for each employee in the ICT the annual average country income per ICT employee is 60 000 Euros. Or in other words – one employee in ICT creates four times the value of average employee in other sectors in financial terms as part of GDP. Playing with words little bit more and – each ICT professional that left the country costs our economy 60 000 Euros per year – money lost from our GDP”, said Aleksandar Ubavkov, Regional manager of Musala Soft – Macedonia and Member of The Management Board of MASIT ICT Chamber of commerce.