How We Survive:
A Series of Special Reports from Macedonia
How We Survive: An Economic Overview
First in a series of four stories - July 1995

"How We Survive" is the culmination of a unique reporting project undertaken by a multi-ethnic team of Macedonian reporters in June 1995. Designed and organized by the Center for War, Peace and the News Media of New York University and Search for Common Ground, the project was led by Denise Hamilton, a veteran feature reporter with the Los Angeles Times. The team consisted of Julijana Kocovska, of Nova Makedonija (Macedonian-language daily), Nazif Zelnulahu of Flaka e Vallazermit (Albanian-language daily), Seyhan Kain of Birlik (Turkish-language thrice-weekly), and Biljana Bejkova of Radio NoMa (Macedonian-language radio station). The four part series was published in July in the three participating newspapers and adapted for broadcast on radio Radio NoMa.

Life in the Republic of Macedonia has become extremely difficult in recent years-almost 220,000 people are out of jobs of making very little money. While private businesses are booming, and the black market thrives, others can barely afford "bread and salt". Meanwhile, the middle class finds itself squeezed to maintain its standard of living.

HOW WE SURVIVE

Zlatan Dimitrevski, 38, works as a taxi driver in Skopje. In order to get his job, Zlatan paid 3,000 Deutsch Mark (1DM=$.70) to the private firm Kompanija S. He works 12 hours each day, six days per week. Out of his 500 DM gross monthly salary, Dimitrievski must pay for his own gas and repair his old Zastava 101.

This isn't unusual except for the fact that Dimitrievski finished the faculty of law and has a solicitor's degree. In today's Macedonia however, he can't find a job in law so he works at unskilled labor.

"I want my dinner table to be full and not - God forbid - to have my eyes looking over garbage containers," Dimitrievski explains.
Dimitrievski's problem is not unique. Officials at the state Employment Bureau say that by April 30, 1995 there were 211,349 people in Macedonia out of work - or more than 25% of the entire labor force. Only half of those people are unskilled. The rest have skills or schooling. A surprising 7,563 of the unemployed have university degrees, including 11 with master's degrees and 3 with PhDs.

Skopje's Employment Bureau is near Vodno, a neighborhood of beautiful villas where the most affluent citizens live. They shop in fancy boutiques that sell Italian clothes, take safari vacations in Kenya and drive expensive new cars. The newly wealthy are not limited to the capital. In Strumica, where those who pick "red-gold" tomatoes earn only 8 Denars per kilo, more than 100 new cars are sold each month.

But other people in Macedonia struggle to survive. They line up at company stores to receive part of their salaries in flour and sugar because their factories cannot afford to pay them in money. In Skopje's Old Town, gypsy children clean car windows for 10 Denars and up to 200 children - including girls of 10 - sell cigarettes on the black market at the Bit Pazar.

Meanwhile, the middle class struggles to retain its standard of living and many are losing the battle. Small merchants who owned sweet shops and bakeries in parts of former Yugoslavia now cut off by war have lost their livelihood. More young people cannot afford their own flats and are postponing marriage and children because of financial insecurity. Nobody seems to be able to say how people manage, but the answers vary with the individual.

Some receive financial help from relatives who live or work abroad. Some work two jobs - officially at their factory and unofficially for private firm. Others collect their next month's salary early, or draw against it from their employer at a very low interest rate. Some turn to the government for social welfare, others to begging. Some bring in products from abroad, which they sell for a small profit. Some grow extra food on land they own in the countryside. Others inherit a flat and sell it, which gives them money for a few years. Young people get money from their parents; a large number would like to emigrate. And many citizens make a living from the black market - a topic that is widely accepted but rarely discussed officially.

But a large number also face dire poverty. Humanitarian organizations say the number of families asking for aid has doubled in the last year. But many of those who accept flour, rice and medicine from various Christian, Muslim and secular charities are too ashamed to admit it.

"There are many families accepting aid from us who are hiding it, they don't want to register with us," says Florim Adem, a volunteer worker at the humanitarian agency El Hilal, which helps 20,000 families, mainly Muslim but also 1,200 Macedonian Orthodox families. "Their houses look very nice from outside, because they were built when families had money years ago, but now they are very poor."

Many of these people are victims of the economic restructuring as socially owned firms are liquidated or privatized. Hardest hit are employees at 23 giant companies such as Tito Metal Factory and Treska Furniture Factory, which will be privatized by Parliamentary law.

Almost 20,000 factory workers have already lost their jobs and now draw average unemployment benefits of about 2,900 Denars ($1=36 Denars) per month, according to government statistics. One such worker is Hasan S. a 36-year-old Rom who lives in Shutka with his wife and five children in one room and a balcony. He used to work at Tito Steel but was laid off and now works part time as a manual laborer. He tried to go to Germany but was sent back. Now his wife is pregnant with their sixth child and doesn't know how they will survive. His only hope is his children, whom he sends to school so they will get an education and have better life than him.

Others continue to work at the ailing factories but collect part of their salary in Denars and the rest in goods. Consider Hasiye Suleymani of Mala Rechitsa. Her husband works at Tetex factory in Tetovo and earns 6,000 Deanars per month to support a family of four children.
For the past three years, they have received one-third of their salary in coupons that are only valid in Tetex stores, which charge high prices. A 50-kilo bag of flour at Tetex costs 1,400 Denars, Hasiye said. Across the street at the private shop, a reporter discovers that the same bag costs only 800 Denars.

One recent day, as she stood in a line to redeem her coupons, Haisye Suleymani was so angry that she could barely speak.

"The goods in this shop are more are more expensive than in other shops and we have no money for school books or shoes, " she said. "And what can I buy here, only chocolate, biscuits, sugar and pork. And we can't eat pork. I am Muslim!"

Haisye says she fells especially betrayed because her husband worked for Tetex for 20 years. Now he has rheumatism and is too sick to look for private work. Haisye said she used to knit sweaters and sell them but it doesn't bring enough money.
"It's very difficult to live like this, children always want something but we can't give it to them," she says. Stories like this abound in Macedonia today. The blockade by Greece is hurting - the country loses $60 million in trade annually because the borders are closed, according to Macedonian officials. About 12% of the entire population is dependent on social welfare, according to Iljaz Sabriu, the minister for labor and social politics. About 37% of the population will be unable to pay medical and hospital expenses this year, according to public health experts.

But the economy has produced winners as well as losers. One who has surmounted difficult barriers to succeed is Necmiye Arif, a Turkish businesswoman who has gained reknown as the only female car dealer in all of Macedonia and the only female Opel car dealer in the world, according to the German firm.

Government statistics from May 1, 1995 show that 79,497 new companies have opened. The breakdown is 62.6% commercial business, 9.4% industrial firms and 9.4% financial services, with varied others.

Most of those are small business but some large private firms have also arisen to replace the obsolete state dinosaurs. Qemal Zhupani of Gostivar owns one such firm. For 15 years he worked for the furniture company Nebojsha Jerkovic, learning everything about furniture business.

In 1991 he started his own furniture manufacturing and retail business in his home- town of Gostivar with 100,000 DM capital gathered with the help of his three sons, who work with him. His company Fatina now employs 70 workers of Albanian, Macedonian and Turkish nationalities and has retail stores in most Macedonian cities.

Zhupani says he would expand his business tomorrow and hire another 60 workers if he could get a low-interest loan from Macedonian government, but that is not forthcoming. But even Zhupani has been hurt by the political and economic difficulties or recent years.

"Prior to the blockade with Serbia, I had 500,00 DM in annual sales to Serbia but for 1994-95, I expect only 10,000 DM," a loss of four-fifths of his business, Zhupani says.

Interviews with many people in Macedonia show that the economic crisis of domestic restructuring, blockades and the Bosnian war has especially hurt families, unskilled or semi-skilled workers, poor villagers and older people who are unable to adapt to the changing environment.

At least some of the young people have possibilities to learn new skills in high demand today such as working with computers, languages and repairing high-tech equipment. Those with money or family connections often are able to open small private business.

"The way young people survive here is to get financial help from their parents or do something illegal," says Kokan Sofroniev, 26, who recently opened a bar in Skopje using capital from friends and family. "People who can't do this can't survive today. We can't talk about a normal life, that's outside of Macedonia."

But the war and blockades have been a boon for smugglers and those plying the black market. A visit to the Serb-Macedonian border reveals cars outfitted with extra-large or double gas tanks loading up with petrol crossing from Macedonia into Serbia. People buy the petrol for 1 DM per liter and sell it for 1.5 DM. Butane bought here for 15 DM sells for double in Serbia. Once there, they buy cartoons of Marlboros for 45 DM per carton, which they smuggle back into Macedonia for sale at 50 DM per carton. The people explain to a reporter that with this business, they can make up to 60 DM per day - another way to survive.

But these are only small fish. The big fish smuggle entire truckloads of fuel and goods. Many of the new wealthy class in Macedonia today are reluctant to give interviews and talk about money and profits or say how they import goods. Others complain about smugglers who import goods using falsified documents to avoid paying high duties. This hurts the entire economy and creates a disadvantage for those operating within law, says Zhivko Golubovski, a businessman who manufactures plastic products at his factory outside of Strumica.

Drug dealing is also blooming. Heroin, which formerly only passed through Macedonia in transit to Western Europe, is now stuck here by the war but finds eager new markets among the bored Albanian and Macedonian youth. Statistics tell the story: in 1969 there were 11 junkies in all Macedonia. Doctors who work with heroin addicts say there are 2,000 registered addicts today and perhaps 20,000 potential addicts.

Despite these dangers, the people of Macedonia, a tough people who have survived countless wars, invasions and hardship, struggle on with in their daily lives. What else can they do?

Perhaps Xhelal Veliu, 49 from the village of Gjepcisti near Tetovo, sums up their situation best. Like Zlatan Dimitrievski, Xhelal Veliu is an attorney who cannot find a job. So he works as a waiter and hopes things will get better. For now, he survives. Barely.
"Plato says a good state is one that can find a way to feed its citizens. I do not want anything else except to be able to feed my wife and two children and work in my profession."