Tourism operators in Vlora, including Italian investors in local tourism sector, a number of whom have chosen to live and work in the south-western coastal city of Vlora, as well as Albania’s friends and well-wishers from neighbouring Italy, attended a meeting with the Prime Minister Edi Rama on Friday to discuss tourism and the region’s tremendous potential of Vlora, a meaningful example of a transformation that has started to generate economy and constantly boost the city’s tourist offer.

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Prime Minister Edi Rama: Thank you very much everyone and before I deliver my remarks at this meeting, I would like to give the floor to the lady in red and black.

She is wearing Albania’s national team red and black jersey and not that of Milan FC, because it is really a honour that all these gentlemen and this lady have joined us today to celebrate exactly this ever growing affinity between Vlora and Italy, where, not long time ago, people from this country were going through horrendous ordeals as they intended to cross the sea helped by clandestine traffic networks and few dared to imagine that years later Vlora would become a destination for many who every day in increased numbers are coming to Vlora, for the sake of the truth, not simply to visit it, but also to stay and live here.

It is my honour and it is my pleasure to give the floor this lady in red and black, who will address the event on behalf of all these men with Italy’s tricolour national flag, a friendly country, although the word friendly doesn’t say it all, because Italy is more than just a friendly country and that’s why we feel home anytime we visit Italy and Italians can’t help but feel themselves home when visiting Albania.

-Mr. Prime Minister, good evening to you and everyone else. We are in love with Vlora and, thanks to you, the city has gone through an incredible transformation, an urban, economic and social transformation and this is quite obvious. Such changes attract Italy a lot. I am here together with many mayors of our Calabria, Calabria students who attend your university here and people who live and work here in Albania. We are very proud that you welcome Calabria and that you care so much about our Calabria.

– I am conveying the greetings from the Italian Parliament and the Foreign Affairs Committee. I am the Committee’s secretary and I am also addressing this event on behalf of my community that has a relation with your community, having this way for such a long time a community in harmony and mutual relations. This is proof showing how we can stay together, smiling and working together. It is the first time I am visiting Vlora and walking along these streets one perceives a city that is evolving and eager to change.

Prime Minister Edi Rama: I’m sorry that the sun is not shining during your first visit to Vlora, but anyway we are very happy because we need rain as these bright lights depend on the rain. Albania’s energy is 100% renewable.

However, it is our bet that the electricity price won’t be increased by a single cent for the household consumers and the small businesses that pay the same pre-crisis electricity rate now. Their electricity bill actually contains just 20 percent of the real energy price, while the rest of the real price, 80% of it, is paid by the government through the state budget.

This way we are hoping to help as many families as possible amid this really tough situation and the crisis that has gripped the whole world, Europe, and Italy too. You Italians know something for sure about it. By keeping the electricity price unchanged, we will make sure that the war-driven inflation remains at a lower rate compared to other countries in the region.

I would like to thank the representatives of all tourism operators in Vlora for this moment.

I am really sorry for the delay and the impracticability to attend a longer meeting, but for objective reasons, as I said before, we drove up to Llogara and it was a downpour and therefore we were forced to use the other side of the new road.

However, I am really happy that Vlora is now a significant example of a transformation that has started to generate an economy and constantly boost the city’s tourist offer. This is definitely also a challenge to enhance capacities and improve service, because it is the service and the quality of the service that make the difference and attract every visitor to return again.

I am also glad that we have already launched two large construction sites that will provide another big boost to tourism and the tourism economy, namely the new tourist port of Vlora, which will attract another category of visitors to this area and will definitely spur another part of the economic chain, especially during the winter, and the new commercial port, which will greatly help the entire fishing industry, creating optimal conditions for that industry, to establish its own place in this territory.

I am convinced that the new development projects already underway and many more other projects to be launched in the future will give a fresh and significant impetus to Vlora itself. The new road being built between Orikum and Dukat, its connection with the Llogara tunnel and driving to the other end of Llogara faster and safer, as well as the Vlora bypass already operational and opened to the traffic are all part of a brand new infrastructure that this region has been lacking over the decades and they will further increase circulation capacity. One shouldn’t forget the new international airport, with work on its construction progressing at a satisfactory pace and therefore we expect the first flight from Vlora International Airport to take place by the end of 2024. I very much hope we won’t encounter surprises in the process, because we have already learned that not everything depends on the plans, readiness, the desire, the hard work and persistence, because most unpredictable things happen and they force us to postpone our plans.

The Vlora airport project was also delayed for reasons out of our will, but with the work now in full swing, should no emergencies happen, I am very confident that the first flight from the new airport will take place by the end of 2024.

I can’t help but mention Vlora river road too, which has opened up a completely different perspective for a completely dormant area until recently, although being a fabulous territory in terms of stunning natural beauties and potential for development of agritourism.

It was earlier today when someone forwarded me a video showing Vlora’s old bazaar that, although I thought I knew every corner of the city, I didn’t know that such a bazaar existed; an area inside a territory that was through an absolute catastrophe because of the chaos and the illegal constructions. However, according to the description from the video’s author, the bazaar dated back to 1900, where exchanges historically took place with merchants and buyers coming from other areas and I am providing this example to show what we have done is absolutely something that he had imagined will actually happen, because we have worked really hard, but a lot remain to be done and I can say this is also the case with whole Albania in every respect.

If we were to look back, it is day and night compared to the time when we took office and embarked on this process, but if we are to look, I can say it is still dawn and the sun has yet to rise compared to how the country will become in the coming years. I think that what matters now is what entrepreneurship will do, because this is the entrepreneurship system with the state being tasked with building and assuring the right conditions, but beyond that it is the entrepreneurs and the entrepreneurship that take the country forward.

I am convinced we have done our maximum in terms of the taxes. It is an old same tune being played constantly and surprisingly enough many tend to listen to and trust it. I am not sure whether they are mentally fit when they issue such claims, but they claim that Albania has high tax rates. Here are our Italian friends. Ask them how high is a 6%VAT rate on hotels? How high is a zero tax rate on small businesses with an annual turnover up to $140,000? Zero! Zero profit tax and zero VAT rate for businesses with turnover up to $100,000.  And ask how high is the 15% profit tax levied on earnings generated by the big companies?

How high is the personal income tax rate in Albania, given that a worker in Italy pays half of his monthly salary in taxes to the state?

Of course, a 23% personal income tax rate is applied to very high paying jobs. However, many tend to tell me not to draw such comparisons, because workers in Europe receive higher wages, but one should consider only half of the salary of a worker in Italy, because the other half is used to pay taxes and tariffs.

If you were to ask your friends and relatives, living and working in Italy, they would tell you they won’t be able to save anything until the end of the month, because life is more expensive there and it has become even more expensive due to the increased energy prices.

Of course, private entrepreneurship has finally started to figure out that they should increase wages for their workers. They should do so if they don’t want to face shortages in the labour force. Given the current conditions of our country, the fabulous beauties and the ongoing changes all over the country, I think it is really possible to aim higher and I am very confident that we will start seeing other results very soon.

Thank you very much.