Researchers of the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences' Institute of Economics discussed the 2010 draft national budget at a news conference on Tuesday.

Garabed Minassian of the Institute's Macroeconomics Department described the draft as "presented in rather general terms, without specific addressees and elusively." He insisted on the importance of "preparing an adequate macroeconomic framework and making the correct diagnosis." Minassian noted that overcoming the crisis requires identifying the causes, so so to eliminate them, rather than mitigating the effects.

Minassian finds inexplicable the expected 2 per cent drop of GDP and reduced level of foreign direct investments in Bulgaria. "Overcoming the crisis is supposed to attract foreign capital back to this country," he noted.

Tatiana Houbenova, Head of the International Economics Department, noted that cheap labor and unemployment in this country will continue to attract foreign investors and, therefore, the forecasts of these investors' waning interest are "overcautious." In her view, it is realistic to expect a 1 per cent drop of GDP.

Yordan Hristoskov of the Regional and Sector Economics Department said that the 2010 budget makes maximum efforts to cater for all social needs. "If all other programs are pared by 10 per cent in the national budget, spending on social assistance is increased by 14 per cent," Hristoskov said. As he put it, for the first time the national budget protects self-dependent elderly people.

Source: BTA