According to an old Serbian fairy tale, God tells a poor man who enters a gold mine that no matter what he chooses to do inside, he’ll be sorry when he leaves. If he takes some gold, he’ll be sorry for not taking more; if he doesn’t, he’ll be sorry for not taking any at all.
Modern Serbia now finds itself in a similar situation to the hero of that ancient tale.
Experts have revealed that parts of South-eastern Serbia lie on two billion tons of oil shale that could be processed into oil worth roughly 60 billion dollars in the next decade.
Further, the introduction and implementation of sufficient technology to turn the crude into derivates could reap between 120 and 180 billion dollars, according to studies by several domestic and international mining institutes and the Serbian ministry of environment and mining, which kept this secret carefully guarded until early January.
“It is our goal to introduce the most modern international technology so that oil shale can become a resource that will significantly improve the energetic balance of Serbia,” Oliver Dulic, minister of environment and mining, said last week on a visit to the small town of Aleksinac, some 210 kilometres south-east of the capital.
The town and its surroundings coalmines, which have been closed since a fatal disaster in the 1980s claimed the lives of 90 miners, lie on the largest bulk of oil shale reserves.
“Our estimates say that oil shale could be exploited for several decades, with an annual production of between 500,000 and 600,000 tons of crude, 100 megawatts of electricity and enough thermal energy to heat Aleksinac and neighbouring villages,” Dulic added.
Yearning for growth
For the last few years, Serbia has barely managed to stay afloat in the tides of the global economic downturn, paying the price for moderate economic improvement with high unemployment and modest salaries.
The country’s unemployment rate soared to 23.7 percent in November 2011, up from just 19 percent in 2010. This is the highest level of unemployment since former dictator Slobodan Milosevic was ousted more than a decade ago, the national statistics bureau said Monday.
A breakdown of the data revealed the youth population to suffer the most, with an unemployment rate of 51.9 percent for the 15-24 age group and 32.0 percent for those between the ages of 25 and 34. But the discovery of shale deposits promises a leg-up for the struggling economy. Dulic proclaimed, “Several thousand people will be employed” once the operation is put into motion with the investment of between 700 and 800 million dollars.
In fact, Dulic
