Experts from Bank Austria have predicted a slowdown of the Bulgarian economy in 2008 and 2009, with expected growth rates in the two years being 5.6 percent and 4.8 percent respectively, local press reported Thursday.
In the past few years, the growth rate remained above 6 percent.
The predictions were based on the vulnerability of the dependent Bulgarian economy in the context of economic globalization and the impact of the current world credit crisis.
Domestic factors such as increasing salaries and a lack of human resources and a double-digit inflation will also contribute to the economic slowdown.
However, since many national economic sectors are performing well, the country's GDP in the first half of 2008 is expected to grow by 6.5 percent, with its manufacturing development and the growth in sales still being among the strongest in the European Union .
The Bank Austria experts also predicted that the Bulgarian government will be transformed from a debtor into a creditor due to the decreasing external debt.
After the Ministry of Finance made an early payoff to the World Bank in March, the country's foreign debt dropped to 5.1 billion leva (about four billion U.S. dollars) or 16 percent of the GDP.
Source: Xinhua
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