Country Sheet : Serbia

Population : 6,605,178 (2024)

Crude natural change rate : -5.4‰ (est. 2023)

Population repartition: 14.5% under 15, 22.1% over 65 (2023)

Crude net migration rate: 0‰ (2023)

First time asylum applicants: 344 (2023)

Life expectancy: men 73.7 years, women 80.2 years (2024)

Religions: Orthodox 84.6%, Catholic 5%, Muslim 3.1%, Protestant 1%, Atheist 1.1%, Other 0.8%, unspecified or unknown 4.5% (2011 est.)

Ethnic groups: Serbs 83.3%, Hungarians 3.5%, Roma 2.1%, Bosnians 2%, others 5.7%, undeclared or unknown 3.4% (2011 est.) The majority of ethnic Albanians boycotted the 2011 census.

Source : Eurostat, The CIA World Factbook

Currency: Serbian Dinar (RSD) (exchange rate in November 2024: €1 = RSD 117)

GDP: €75,204 million (2023)

GDP per capita (PPS): €6,500 (2023)

GDP growth : 3.8% (2023)

Inflation: 4.6% (October 2024)

Public debt: 52% of GDP (2023)

Unemployment: 8.2% (June 2024)

Stock of foreign direct investment from the entire world: 6.5% of GDP (2023)

Budget balance: -3% of GDP (2023)

Source : Eurostat, IMF, XE, Trading Economics, DG Trésor

Composition of the National Assembly since December 2023 :

• 112 seats SNSDS (Coalition Serbia Must Not Stop, around the SNS, Serbian Progressive Party)
• 14 seats SSP (Party of Freedom and Justice, social democrat)
• 13 seats SPS (Socialist Party of Serbia)
• 13 seats NPS-NLS (People's Movement of Serbia - The New Face of Serbia, conservative)
• 13 seats NADA (National Democratic Alternative)
• 10 seats ZLF (Green-Left Front, environmentalist)
• 9 seats SRCE (Centre of Serbia)
• 8 seats DS (Democratic Party, social-democrat)
• 6 seats MI-GIN (We - People's Voice, populist)
• 6 seats MI-SN (We - People's Power, populist)
• 6 seats PSG-SDAS-PDD (Free Citizens Movement - Sandžak Democratic Action Party - Democratic Action Party)
• 6 seats PUPS-SP (Party of Pensioners, Peasants and Proletarians of Serbia - Solidarity and Justice)
• 6 seats VMSZ/SVM (Alliance of Magyars of Vojvodina)
• 6 seats SDPS (Social Democratic Party of Serbia)
• 6 seats ZS-RS-USS (Holy Serbia - Russian Party - United Peasants Party)
• 6 seats independents
• 5 seats JS (United Serbia, populist)
• 5 seats EU (Ecological Uprising)

Relations with the EU

• A Stabilisation and Association Agreement (SAA) was signed on 29 April 2008, with its application subject to Serbia's full cooperation with the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY). Visa liberalisation was granted by the EU on 19 December 2009. Serbia applied for EU membership on 22 December 2009 and was granted candidate country status by the European Council on 1 March 2012. On 1 September 2013, the SAA entered into force, followed by the opening of accession negotiations on 21 January 2014
• At present, 22 chapters are open for negotiation, two of which have already been provisionally closed. In May 2021, the Council agreed to apply the revised enlargement methodology to the accession negotiations with Serbia, with the aim of relaunching the accession process and strengthening its political aspect.
• The dialogue between Serbia and Kosovo, initiated in 2011 and facilitated by the EU, remains complicated despite the Brussels (2013) and Ohrid (2023) agreements.

• in the government: 10/33
• in the Parliament: 94/250

Next Elections: