Over-regulation, expensive energy and the lack of human resources are among the reasons for the poor state of the European economy. This was said by Vasil Velev, Chairman of the Board of the Industrial Capital Association (AIKB), in the studio of Bloomberg TV Bulgaria.
The ECB's interest rate policy may have an impact on the European economy, but there are other fundamentally wrong factors that are causing businesses to leave the EU, he believes.
There is no way, when natural gas is 4-5 times more expensive in Europe than in the US, and when there are regulations that overwhelm companies, and the Green Deal, which is obviously wrong, that the ECB's interest rate policy will stop European business to flee Europe, he said.
„To the expensive energy and the many regulations, we add the lack of human resources with this problem Europe continues to be unable to deal with”, he said.
The remaining global players, which years ago lagged behind the EU in many indicators, are now ahead of the Union in education and qualified personnel, according to the chairman of the AIKB Board.
He also noted that there is too much administrative burden in Bulgaria in attracting able-bodied, qualified and willing to work migrants.
According to him, the past years 2022 and 2023 were good for business in our country and some sectors have “pulled“ the industry to serious growth. “This also allowed income growth, all this shortened the distance to the Central European standard“, commented Velev.
He linked reaching 64% of the average European level in terms of purchasing power parity with the reversal of migration processes.
Last year, we had 41,000 more people who changed their residence to Bulgaria than left Bulgaria, Velev said.
It is good news if this is a permanent trend, because we have no other option at all to deal with the labor market, which, as a result of the demographic catastrophe, has had huge deficits for years, he added.
However, Velev drew attention to the fact that the peak in the economy, reached in the last two years, is passing and now the economy is moving downwards. He noted that for the next 2-3 years, the European economy is predicted to have significantly lower growth than the global average.
Strengthened digitalization, automation and production with a higher added value to some extent compensate for the lack of personnel in our country, but in the countries of Western Europe, which are ahead in these indicators, they also suffer from a shortage of human resources, he believes . There is no way that the obstacles in the EU will not be reflected here, both directly and indirectly, since nearly 70% of Bulgaria's exports are to other member countries, commented Velev.