Bulgaria records 0.9% economic growth in 2013
Bulgaria’s economy grew by 0.9 per cent last year, based on preliminary data, the country’s National Statistics Institute (NSI) said on March 5. In real terms, gross domestic product (GDP) in 2013 was 78.1 billion leva, or 39.9 billion euro.
Bulgaria missed the government’s growth target again, albeit narrowly. Initially set at 1.8 per cent, the official growth target was later revised downward to one per cent.
NSI also announced the final growth data for 2012 and said that the country’s economy grew by 0.6 per cent that year, down from the 0.8 per cent figure announced a year ago, based on preliminary data.
The statistics board gave no additional data for the full year 2013.
In the fourth quarter of 2013, according to preliminary data, Bulgaria’s economy grew by 0.3 per cent compared to the previous quarter and 1.2 per cent compared to the last quarter of 2012.
In real terms, GDP in the fourth quarter was 21.46 billion leva or 11 billion euro.
That figure put Bulgaria’s economic growth in the lower half of the EU table announced by the bloc’s statistics board Eurostat on March 5.
Among EU member states for which data is available, Sweden posted the strongest quarterly growth in the fourth quarter of 2013, at 1.7 per cent, followed by the Czech Republic (1.6 per cent) and Romania (1.5 per cent).
The economies of Cyprus (-1.0 per cent), Denmark (-0.5 per cent), Finland (-0.3 per cent) and Estonia (-0.1 per cent) registered quarterly decreases.
Overall, the EU28 economy grew by 0.4 per cent in the last quarter of 2013 and the euro zone posted 0.3 per cent quarterly growth. Over the whole year 2013, GDP fell by 0.5 per cent in the euro area and rose by 0.1 per cent in the EU28, Eurostat said.
(Photo: Sanja Gjenero)
