A fund for innovations and technological development has been already formed by the Macedonian government for the first time. The fund is expected to launch its activities in January 2014 after enacting its statute.

Prime Minister Nikola Gruevski said Thursday the fund would help the innovators in Macedonia. "The largest companies are at the same time the most powerful and progressive because they rely on innovations, new ideas."

"The fund will help those companies with innovations that can be commercialized. It will be financed by the budget. The World Bank has also shown readiness to support the fund. Eight million euros will be set aside for the fund in the first three years with a bulk of them provided as a direct assistance to companies reporting innovations. An international board in charge of reviewing and analyzing all the applications will pick the companies," Gruevski stated after opening a new elementary school in the settlement of Cair in Skopje.

He called on all creative people in Macedonia with innovations to count on support from the state fund, because "it is established to help the Macedonian citizens and companies."

"We want to support profit-oriented innovations which could pave the way toward opening of new jobs in Macedonia, which is the primary objective of our economic policies," PM Gruevski concluded.