Serbian economic policy in Vardar Macedonia (1918-1941)

The Kingdom of Serbia, which did not acknowledge the existence of Bulgarians in Macedonia, called the area Južna Srbija (Southern Serbia) and conducted a policy whose ultimate end was the thorough and exhaustive ethnic conversion of Macedonian Bulgarians. By introducing Serbian colonists into strategically important areas, agrarian reform pursued the purely political tasks of changing the ethnically Bulgarian character of the area and creating a national basis for strengthening the Serbian régime. The abject backwardness of Macedonia in agricultural production was patently obvious. The Belgrade government failed to create any conditions for the utilisation of natural resources whose surpluses could have found natural outlets in industrial production. Only the lowest degree of industrialisation was manifest. The economic problems of Vardar Macedonia were the natural consequence of obstacles in the way of industrialisation in a technologically backward economy based on petty village agriculture.