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Just a few days ago, the Czech government's trade promotion agency, CzechTrade, became the third such agency in Europe to receive the ISO 9001:2000 certificate in what can be seen as a pioneering project of introducing a quality management system to the state sector.

The Czech Telecom privatisation deal has definitively fallen through. Czech average wage grows, as does the minimum officially guaranteed wage. Trade minister would like to boost trade with Eastern developing countries. State budget deficit rises by 9.4 billion in one month. More redundancies expected at the national rail carrier Ceske Drahy. The current account gap for the third quarter reached just over 50 billion crowns. Finance Minister has announced a package aimed at reforming the health care system.

The Czech armaments industry has gone through many changes since the fall of communism. Through reorganization, privatization, and the loss of the massive Soviet market the Czech Republic's arms industry is just a fraction of what it once was. Martin Hrobsky explores how one of the world largest arms producers took it upon itself to create a more peaceful world only to find out that it was not in the countries economic interests to do so.

Along with many other industrialized countries around the world the Czech Republic has begun the process of restructuring its energy sector. Liberalization and efficiency are two themes which are driving the production, distribution, and use of energy. In this week's economics report we look at how successful the Czech Republic has been in liberalizing the energy sector and we will investigate how liberalization is effecting the increasing importance of energy efficiency in the Czech Republic.

For many years, rent dodgers and other debtors had quite an easy life in the Czech Republic. Being in state hands, utility companies during the communist regime were reluctant to collect debts. The situation started changing after 1989 with the arrival of the free market, yet it took several years after the collapse of communism before people who owed large sums of money on rent, electricity and gas began feeling pressure to clear their debts. While town halls resort to moving rent defaulters to bare, unequipped flats at city outskirts or to confiscating

The international rating agency Standard and Poor's has downgraded the Czech Republic's credit rating from AA- to A+. The Agriculture Ministry says it might need do double its budget after the Czech Republic's EU accession, while Czech food producers are gearing up for tougher competition. The government has postponed the signing of a contract to sell its majority stake in Czech Telecom to strategic investor. The Czech capital Prague is becoming increasingly attractive for businesses from around the world. Although little known at home, Czech aviation

The Czech public finance deficit is expected to grow to 6.3 percent of GDP in 2003, exceeding the Maastricht criterion for joining Eurozone by more than 100 percent. Czech companies are gradually gaining a foothold in markets in China and the former Soviet Union - territories they abandoned after the fall of the Communist regime in the early 1990s. The world-famous Czech brewery Budejovicky Budvar has won another trade-mark dispute with America's Anheuser-Busch. The Ministry of Transport is considering the introduction of an electronic toll for

Employees of Czech car maker Skoda staged a protest demonstration outside the factory in Mlada Boleslav last Friday for fears of lay-offs due to reported changes in the global strategy of the Volkswagen group to which Skoda has belonged since 1991. The chairman of Skoda's Trade Unions Jaroslav Povsik talks about mounting uncertainty and fears among the employees of the Czech flagship exporter but he remains optimistic about the future, even if Skoda's product range is reduced to one small model.

The Czech government approved cuts the proposed 2003 state budget deficit by a third, and made flood relief the top priority. The Czech trade balance worsened in September. The Netherlands removed its objection to the Czech Republics closing of the economic chapter in EU accession negotiations. While one of the country's mobile operators is facing serious financial problems, another one is considering expansion worldwide.

The Czech Republics unique mix of a cheap and highly skilled labor force has led to the development of a progressive and highly developed information technology industry. In many ways the Czech Republic is increasingly being considered the silicon valley of the East. In this weeks economics report we look at how these Czech IT firms are exporting their products to the highly competitive global market.