Democratic Party MP Jorida Tabaku was present today at the presentation of the American Chamber of Commerce’s (AmCham) 2025 Business Index, a report that recorded the lowest level since 2013 and highlighted a sharp deterioration in the business climate, as well as a decline in the confidence of entrepreneurs in the Albanian economy.
According to data published by AmCham, the Overall Business Index fell to 40.34 points, while several key indicators posted the steepest declines of the past decade.
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Among the indicators with the most negative results were corruption, which fell from 38.25 to 28.89 points, government bureaucracy, from 35.93 to 26.39 points, monopolies and unfair competition, from 30.96 to 26.11 points, as well as the domestic political climate, which suffered the largest drop, falling to 28.06 points. Likewise, the performance of the Albanian economy lost more than 11 points compared with a year earlier.
During the discussion, Tabaku stressed that these results should not be seen simply as the perception of the business community, but as a reflection of the structural problems that, according to her, have been created in the Albanian economy in recent years.
She said that one of the biggest concerns is linked to the fact that many reforms and laws adopted within the framework of European integration have remained only on paper, while businesses continue to face legal uncertainty, bureaucracy, and selective enforcement of the law.
The Democratic MP focused in particular on the decline in the corruption indicator, which she linked to the concentration of the market in the hands of a few economic operators and the weakening of real competition.
According to Tabaku, fewer and fewer entities are operating in many sectors of the economy, while direct contracts and privileges concentrated in a few hands are increasing, a situation that, according to her, creates fertile ground for monopolies and oligopolies to the detriment of the free market.
She also raised concerns about the effects that money laundering and the informal economy have had on the country’s economic structure. Tabaku underlined that the devaluation of the euro by around 30% in recent years has not been accompanied either by productivity growth or by an increase in exports, but has instead produced serious consequences for productive sectors.
According to her, agriculture, manufacturing industry, and the garment sector have been among the hardest hit, while the economy has become increasingly oriented toward non-productive activities and sectors that benefit from informal money.
Another of her criticisms concerned what she described as the “economic model of favoritism,” in which special laws and fiscal exemptions give an advantage to certain sectors or investors, to the detriment of fair competition.
Tabaku said these favors do not stop only with strategic investors, but also include other fiscal policies that distort the market and direct capital toward activities that do not produce sustainable development and do not distribute prosperity across the entire economy.
“When the economy is based on exemptions, favoritism, and the concentration of the market in the hands of a few operators, then we see productive investment leaving, corruption rising, and an economy that becomes less and less competitive,” Tabaku argued.
In conclusion, she called for a review of the economic model, the drafting of a fiscal code with stable rules for all businesses, greater transparency in fiscal policies, and concrete measures to encourage productive sectors, exports, and free competition.
“This index should serve as an alarm bell. We cannot build a modern economy with monopolies, with fiscal favors handed out on a case-by-case basis, and with productive sectors losing ground year after year,” Tabaku said.
