Georgi Angelov, senior economist at Open Society Institute:Reasonable macro policy is what prevents economies from serious crises

It is quite naive to consider that the state can interfere, especially financially, during a crisis. If Bulgaria is severely hit by the crisis, the state budget and finances will be those to suffer the most.
The real estate sector is overregulated and in some cases inconsiderately regulated – we see bureaucracy, long deadlines, unclear compensations, complicated procedures and lavish corruption. I think that the time is right to work hard for removing these drawbacks from the industry.
Future improvement efforts should concern two aspects. Firstly, we have to escape from grave financial or debt crisis, which means avoiding catastrophic risks. This can be achieved by use of reasonable macro policy – retaining the currency board, maintaining stable state budget, managing the trust in the financial system, etc.
Secondly, we have to retain investment confidence and increase economic competition. This will guarantee easier transition through the crisis. Retaining capital flows, albeit smaller, is extremely important for all economical sectors. Bulgarian economic growth is mostly financed by foreign capital. The amount of the capital inflow in the country for the past 12 months was EUR 12 billion. We can try to imagine what would happen if this inflow suddenly stops.
In order to achieve the goals we need reforms within the business environment. These reforms concern decrease in taxes, insurances and quasi tax encumbrances, improvement in the efficiency of the public sector and public services, including concentrated efforts to support institutions (court, police etc.).
The time when investors were not afraid of the heavy bureaucratic machine has now ended. Nowadays countries have to provide beneficial conditions for investors as competition regarding attracting investment has increased, while investors and investments decrease on a global scale.

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