The Australian Ambassador in Prilep and Bitola: Plenty of Talk About Investment, but on the Table Only Grants for NGOs

Australian Ambassador Peter Truswell, based in Belgrade and accredited to Macedonia, toured Pelagonia in two days. On 22 September he met the mayor of Prilep, Dejan Prodanoski, and on 23 September the mayor of Bitola, Toni Konjanovski. The press releases from both municipalities read as if they'd been written by the same hand: "economic potential", "investment opportunities", "deepening cooperation".

Konjanovski told the ambassador something every family in Bitola has long known: Bitola and its surroundings are a region of economic emigrants - "pečalbari", as they're called here - and a significant share of Macedonians living outside the country live precisely in Australia. "We jointly concluded that we have a good basis for continuing and deepening cooperation in several areas," the mayor said. According to the press release, the ambassador was impressed by the "Manaki Brothers" film camera festival.

In Prilep, officials recalled that the municipality has had formal cooperation since 2008 with what was then the Town of Vincent in Perth, now the City of Vincent. Prodanoski presented the town as a place with a "favourable business climate", especially when it comes to the region's natural resources and raw materials. "Prilep has something to offer," he said.

The only concrete thing to come out of both meetings is the Australian embassy's Direct Aid Program - a scheme that supports locally initiated projects by civil society and non-governmental organisations, with a focus on the green transition, the environment, and opportunities for women and young people. Useful stuff. But these are small grants for associations - not a factory, and not the "Australian investment" the headlines promised after the meetings.

And one more detail that shouldn't be skipped: a country where a significant share of Macedonians abroad live still covers Macedonia from its embassy in Belgrade. Maybe that's the real topic for the next handshake. A region built on emigration, in any case, knows better than anyone the difference between a handshake and a job.