Estonia still attractive

  • 2010-05-26

TALLINN - CEO of KPMG Baltics Andris Jegers stated that although Estonia’s advantages as a destination for investments, in comparison to other CEE countries, have fallen slightly, businesspeople believe that foreign investments will continue flowing in, reports Aripaev Online. “A little more than a third of the respondents [of the business poll] estimated that Estonia has lost a number of advantages in the eyes of foreign investors - the taxes are not very low in comparison to the neighboring countries,” explained Jegers.

He added that nearly half of the respondents - the biggest group - considered Estonia to be on the same level as the other Central and Eastern European countries in terms of its attractiveness for foreign investments.
“Estonia’s small size is also a limiting factor,” noted Andres Root, a member of the management board of KPMG Baltics. He said that China, for example, is currently actively buying enterprises but Estonia is too small for Chinese companies. “We are the focus of interest of Scandinavian entrepreneurs - Finland and Sweden mostly look at Estonia,” he added.

Jegers remarked that despite the relative decline in Estonia’s attractiveness as a target country of investments, nearly 60 percent of the respondents of the poll estimated that in the next year, foreign investors would increase their capital investments in Estonia. “Quite a lot - 36 per cent - believe that the current level of investments will be maintained.
According to Root, the Baltic region is generally a feared area at the moment, but Estonia’s position will improve due to the adoption of the euro.