A promotion of the “Sail Serbia” project, organised by the Port Governance Agency, was held in Sombor today. The “Sail Serbia” project was initiated by the Port Governance Agency with the aim of building infrastructure for passenger and nautical traffic (marinas and international passenger ports) and developing scheduled services and canal tourism. In addition to the Port Governance Agency, the project involves the Government of the Republic of Serbia, headed by Prime Minister Ana Brnabić, and the Ministry of Construction, Transport and Infrastructure, headed by Minister Goran Vesić. The Mayor of Smederevo, Jovan Beč, and Maja Ćirković, Member of the City Council responsible for culture, tourism and information, attended the presentation of the conceptual design of the “Sail Serbia” project today.
For the City of Smederevo, the “Sail Serbia” project will initially involve desilting the marina, followed later by the preparation of design documentation for building a proper marina that would attract domestic and foreign tourists. In this way, by solving a long-standing problem for the City of Smederevo, we would gain both economic and social benefits. The economic benefit lies in a rise in tourist numbers and revenue, while the social benefit involves raising the awareness of the local community and the business public, as well as the visibility of our nautical potential at home and abroad. This potential was recognised some time ago by Mayor Beč, who, in cooperation with the Port Governance Agency and its director, Vuk Perović, fought to ensure that solving the problems with the marina in Smederevo would make it possible to develop tourism potential in the future.
“Before the pandemic, 1,542 dockings were recorded in Serbia, and many more tourists are expected this year, which will bring our country significant economic benefits. We will build marinas in Smederevo, Veliko Gradište, Golubac, Kladovo and Sombor. We will build an international passenger port in Banoštor, and we will have pontoons for scheduled services in Sremski Karlovci, Novi Sad and Sombor,” said the Minister of Construction, Transport and Infrastructure, Goran Vesić, among other things.
Minister Vesić also stressed that Serbia has no sea, but it has two large rivers, the Danube and the Sava. This means that Serbia has 1,680 kilometres of navigable waterways and more than 650 kilometres of canal network, and this capacity will begin to be used with the implementation of the “Sail Serbia” project.
Rivers are Serbia’s chance for better connections, a better quality of life and economic development, because developing nautical tourism can also help create new jobs and boost trade for local producers and hosts, and above all raise Serbia’s reputation.
