The President of the Republic of Bulgaria Rumen Radev, the Prime Minister Galab Donev, the Executive Vice-President of the European Commission Valdis Dombrovskis and the Minister of Finance Rositsa Velkova opened the conference ‘Bulgaria on the Path to the Euro’. Deputy Minister of Economy and Industry Irina Shtonova also participated in the event.
The aim of the forum is to discuss the opportunities and challenges of Bulgaria’s membership in the euro area, what the process of introducing the euro as a national currency involves, to discuss what has been done so far and what is ahead.
During the opening ceremony it was underlined that the Bulgarian economy has made significant progress in its preparations for the introduction of the euro and for its future successful functioning in the euro area, and the caretaker government will continue its work to implement this strategic priority. It was also pointed out that studies in countries that have already adopted the European currency show that this does not negatively affect inflation, but this is mainly due to unfair trade practices.
In the second panel of the forum, a discussion was held in which the participants presented their views on the progress of our country on the way to joining the euro area and what still needs to be done to make sure that our country is ready to introduce the euro as a national currency and to cope with the challenges of its upcoming euro area membership.
The event was also attended by the Deputy Prime Minister for EU Funds Management Atanas Pekanov, the Governor of the Bulgarian National Bank Dimitar Radev, the Minister of Finance of Croatia Marko Primorac, representatives of European institutions and the Bulgarian NGO sector, among others.
