Has the Belgrade Fair deserved to be enabled to do its job?

Participating with all its capacities and resources in the fight against the global pandemic, and due to the character and scope of its activities, the Belgrade Fair has reached a vicious circle of business depression, from which it is almost impossible to get out without serious state support and increased respect for its activity.

Although they have a completely different purpose, the medical profession estimated that the halls of the Belgrade Fair, with their size and infrastructure, were significantly more suitable for the care of the least infected patients than some other locations.

The Belgrade Fair, together with its partners, has been engaged in additional adaptation, equipment, functionality and humanization of this extremely sensitive hospital environment. Although such a choice in such a delicate case for the Belgrade Fair could only be a compliment, it produced sharp negative associations and inappropriate allusions in one part of the public. By emphasizing the negative impression of an objectively sensitive, forced and temporary situation, at the very beginning of the huge work that needed to be done, the entire activity of this exemplary company, its international reputation, social and business morality, but also decades of history were placed in a negative context. Its humanitarian activities, those for whom it was supposed to be a job and who had media opportunities did not bother to remind the public that the Belgrade Fair has shown many times so far that it is the most reliable support in crisis situations. This was the case during the years of international community sanctions, during the NATO bombing, when hundreds of flood victims had to be taken care of, and in dozens of other cases when the Belgrade Fair successfully and selflessly organized and distributed humanitarian aid to those in need.

The Belgrade Fair did all that at its own expense. During that time, some countries, and to this day many, have launched entire systems of unconditional assistance and comprehensive financial measures for the immediate and efficient rehabilitation of this powerful and temporarily blocked global industry.