Economic growth next year could amount to 0.3 percent, but there is a risk that there may be no growth at all, or that only stagnation will occur.
Such a forecast is unofficially reported from the Croatian National Bank.
The HNB expects that next year exports will exceed imports, and that the exchange rate of the kuna will remain stable. Wages will nominally stagnate, while real income will decline, and inflation is expected to be lower than this year’s, amounting to 3.2 percent.
Personal consumption of citizens is expected to increase by 0.3 percent. Despite positive forecasts, a further increase in the number of unemployed has been announced. Next year, they say at the HNB, the unemployment rate could reach as high as 20 percent.
These unofficial forecasts from the HNB come a day after Governor Boris Vujčić criticized the Government in an interview with Reuters, stating that the Government did not impose sufficient cuts in budget spending for 2013, and that structural reforms were too slow in the first year of their mandate.
