Meeting with the Commercial Counsellor of the Slovak Republic at BCCI

 The Commercial Counsellor of the Embassy of Slovakia, Mr. Peter Kovach visited BCCI and met with its President, Mr. Tsvetan Simeonov. During the meeting future joint events for the year were discussed and planned, among which a visit by a Slovak business delegation to Varna in June, broad participation of Slovak companies in the International Fair in Plovdiv in the fall, and a Bulgarian business mission, which together with representatives of the Ministry of Economy, Energy and Tourism will visit Bratislava in October this year.

 

Mr. Kovach presented the newest developments in the Slovak economy, which is slowly recovering from the global financial crisis. While in 2006, the country’s GDP growth was 4%, in 2009 it was negative. During the past year growth rate reached the results from 2006 and the forecasts for the next two years are optimistic – 3,5% and 4,5% respectively.

 

The country still experiences problems with unemployment, which currently is 14,5%. Inflation remained relatively low during the past year. In 2011 it is expected to reach 3-4%, while only for the first quarter the prices of food products and necessity goods grew by about 6%. The average monthly salary in Slovakia is €785.

 

As far as the country’s foreign trade is concerned, both import and export grew significantly in 2010 as compared to 2009. The trade turnover of Slovakia in 2010 was €98 billion in total. Trade was relatively balanced with export slightly exceeding. This tendency was preserved in the beginning of this year as well.  

 

The Netherlands are the biggest investor both for Bulgaria and Slovakia, but the data shows that these are often indirect investments originating from third countries.

 

At the moment, the Slovak economy is upheld by several basic important industries – the automotive industry with 3 plants, and production of electric household appliances.

 

The bilateral trade between Bulgaria and Slovakia also increased in 2010 copared to 2009. Slovakia’s export for Bulgaria grew by 7.8%, while Bulgarian import for Slovakia grew by 10.5%. Mr. Simeonov and Mr. Kovach found out significant discrepancies in the trade turnover statistics of the two countries, but the common view is that Bulgaria exports mainly cables, conductors, petroleum oils, metals and metal elements, textiles and food products to Slovakia. On the other hand, we import mainly Slovak telephones, TV sets, computers, food products, paper and cardboard, paper products, medicines, etc.