December the 11th, 2024 – A Croatian returnee has been provided with 20,000 euros upon coming back to Croatia from the state. “It’s not that terrible here,” says the recipient, Mateja.
As Poslovni Dnevnik writes, despite it once being announced by the government that thousands would turn into Croatian returnees, the “I Choose Croatia/Biram Hrvatsku” measure intended for those who had left the country encouraged only 700 people to return.
Mateja Kobeščak is one such Croatian returnee who headed to the United Kingdom as soon as she graduated from university. She spent four years living in Britain, before returning to Croatia two years ago. Government incentives were an incentive for turning her into a Croatian returnee, and understandably so, as she received around 20,000 euros to come back and open her own marketing agency.
“It meant a huge amount to me when I came back to Croatia. I still didn’t have my clients here and I knew that it would certainly be a few months before my business would get established again, and that I wouldn’t have a steady income. So, for that first period when I didn’t have an income, that financial assistance meant the most to me. And that’s what I got from those incentives,” Croatian returnee Mateja told RTL.
most of the beneficiaries of this incentive are in (you guessed it…) slavonia
Since the “I Choose Croatia/Biram Hrvatsku” measure was introduced a mere three years ago, 729 people have returned. Around five million euros have been allocated for the measure and almost 9 million euros on top is intended for self-employment. That makes a grand total of almost 14 million euros for the Croatian returnee plan.
Ante Lončar, director of the Croatian Employment Service (CES), pointed out: “Today you saw that out of those 700 approved applications, over 1,100 newly employed people are currently working. So, the efficiency is higher – these people have returned, and on top of that, they’ve hired additional people.”
According to the Ministry of Labour, most people using this measure were doing so to return to Slavonia. More specifically speaking, 86 to Osijek-Baranja County, and 81 to Brod-Posavina County. Eastern Croatian counties are closely followed by the City of Zagreb, where 80 people returned. Minister of Labor Marin Piletić is satisfied with the implementation of the measure so far.
“it isn’t a measure to simply laugh at”
“We still believe that there’s much greater interest in the “I Choose Croatia/Biram Hrvatsku” measure. These are just the initial results. You need to consider the fact that even today, you can people who returned after spending ten years of abroad saying how it took them about two to two and a half years to decide to make some kind of financial plan of their own,” said Minister Piletić.
Prime Minister Andrej Plenković also has a message for all those who criticised this Croatian returnee measure.
“It’s no longer a measure to be laughed at, in fact, it’s quite the opposite. The Croatian returnee measure is very useful and concrete. When someone decides to return home to Croatia with their business idea, with certain specific experience that they have gained elsewhere, they’ve got measure available for them,” said PM Plenković.
“It’s not that terrible in Croatia”
Croatian returnee Mateja didn’t regret returning home to Croatia. In addition to setting up her own business, she also started a family here.
“It turned out that there’s plenty of demand for what I do, and that it isn’t that terrible in Croatia. Things don’t run quite as smoothly as they do abroad, but it isn’t that bad either. I haven’t regretted coming back for a single moment. I don’t regret returning, or opening my business in Croatia. In fact, I’m rather enjoying it,” she said.
Starting in the New Year, new Croatian returnees will not have to pay income tax for five years. It remains to be seen whether this will attract them to return to the country in larger numbers in the future.
