Rest of Europe countries are no longer favouring Russia as a manufacturing location. According to fDi Markets data, the country has recorded just four manufacturing projects from countries in the rest of Europe in January to September 2011. Given there were 19 such projects recorded in 2010, this is much less than the projected figure for this period.

Russia has consistently attracted the largest number of manufacturing projects from rest of Europe countries since 2003, with the exception of 2005 when Ukraine recorded 18 to Russia's 15. Ukraine has been the second most popular destination since 2003, while Serbia has been third.

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In 2010, however, Serbia attracted the second largest number of manufacturing projects from rest of Europe countries, with eight recorded, and in 2011 so far, it has attracted 10, more than twice as many as Russia.

Some of the larger projects into Serbia this year include the announcement in June of Slovenia’s SL Consult's €500,000 investment to build a goat farm in Vojvodina. It will export milk to the EU. In March, Bosnian furniture maker Sconto Prom opened a new production unit, investing approximately Nm1m to equip the facility.

fDi Markets data also reveals that the rest of Europe countries tend to stick to their own region for manufacturing investments, with Romania, Bosnia-Herzegovina and Bulgaria holding fourth, fifth and sixth positions respectively. China and India received the seventh and eighth most investments from rest of Europe countries respectively, followed by Kazakhstan and Vietnam, which received the ninth and tenth most investments respectively.

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