FREIGHT FORWARDING INDUSTRY - THE CONTEMPORARY ROLE AND DEVELOPMENT TRENDS IN SERBIA

The freight forwarding industry has been changed and developed through the history, as a result of the development in trade, transportation, other related industry sectors, logistics and information technologies, laws, and other social, economic and political changes. By using the available literature and analysing the statistical data of EU and Serbia, we examined briefly the current role and development trends in the freight forwarding industry, following the NACE industrial classification of economic activities. The results confirmed that this subsector has a crucial importance within the logistics sector and, consequently, in the national economy on a whole. In the same time, it is highly diversified on the market, "hidden" and underestimated in the classification of activities, and not precisely recognized by current NACE classification. Further, the freight forwarding industry in Serbia shows some specificities comparing to the EU experience.