Film and other creative industries could offer young people across the Western Balkans new career opportunities while strengthening regional competitiveness, but governments and institutions need to ensure such careers are economically viable, Regional Cooperation Council Secretary General Amer Kapetanović said.
Speaking at the Sarajevo Film Festival, Kapetanović said creative industries already account for roughly 3% to 5% of GDP and around 3.5% of employment across Southeast Europe, making culture an economic sector rather than simply an artistic or social activity.
“This is not a marginal sector. It already has a real economic impact, and that is what makes it important for regional cooperation,” Kapetanović said.
His remarks came as the Western Balkans continue to struggle with high youth unemployment, which he put at around 25% to 30%.
“Film and the wider creative industries can give young people careers built on their own skills and ideas, but only if those careers are viable,” he said. “That is why we do not treat culture as decoration.”
Kapetanović was opening a discussion titled “What Do We Ask of the Next Generation? Film, Democracy and Regional Competitiveness”, held as part of the Second Regional Conference on Youth Cultural Cooperation.
The conference was organised by the RCC’s EU-funded Western Balkans Youth Lab in cooperation with the Sarajevo Film Festival.
EU: Young people need power to shape their future
Luigi Soreca, head of the European Union Delegation to Bosnia and Herzegovina, said young filmmakers should not be expected to defend democratic values without being given the resources and opportunities needed to do so.
“If we expect young filmmakers to defend democratic values and challenge established narratives, we must also create the conditions that allow them to do so,” Soreca said.
That, he said, meant providing skills, financing and opportunities for regional mobility.
Young people should not merely be invited to listen to decisions made by others but should have the ability to “help design their European future,” Soreca said, pointing to Creative Europe and Erasmus+ as examples of EU investment in the next generation.
Film, democracy and competitiveness
The Sarajevo discussion brought together representatives of European institutions and the regional film industry.
Participants included Tobias Flessenkemper, head of the Youth Department at the Council of Europe; Maja Vukić, deputy CEO of the Croatian Audiovisual Centre; film director Tamara Todorović; and Čarna Vučinić, producer and founder of Naked.
Stefan Prohorov, an international relations expert at the Bulgarian Film Centre, moderated the discussion.
Young artists from Western Balkan art academies, emerging filmmakers and participants in the Sarajevo Film Festival’s Talents Sarajevo programme also took part.
The debate focused on the growing expectations placed on younger filmmakers — from creating competitive cultural products to defending democratic values and challenging established narratives — while stressing that institutions must treat young people as partners rather than merely beneficiaries of cultural policies.
25 young artists brought into Sarajevo Film Festival
The discussion formed part of the Second Regional Conference on Youth Cultural Cooperation, which gave 25 young artists and emerging filmmakers from across the Western Balkans access to the Sarajevo Film Festival programme.
Participants were able to present their work, meet filmmakers and actors, exchange experiences with industry professionals and participate in selected Sarajevo Film Festival and Talents Sarajevo events throughout the festival week.
The programme builds on the RCC’s broader effort to connect young people across the region through its Western Balkans Youth Lab, an EU-funded project designed to establish structured dialogue between young people and policymakers.
For Kapetanović, however, the economic argument is increasingly important.
With youth unemployment still running at roughly a quarter or more of the young workforce in parts of the region, the creative economy offers an opportunity to turn artistic talent into employment, entrepreneurship and regional cooperation.
“Talent is personal, but it rarely grows alone,” Kapetanović said earlier during the Sarajevo programme. “It needs opportunity, space and other talented people around it.”
The challenge for the Western Balkans is therefore not simply to produce another generation of talented filmmakers, but to create an economy in which they can afford to remain, work and build careers in the region.