News

The new "Economic and Investment Profile of Sofia" (2022), prepared by the IME for the Sofia Investment Agency, was published today. The profile shows the rapid development of Sofia after the pandemic, with the capital's gross domestic product reaching over BGN 59 billion in 2021. Sofia concentrates more than half of the gross added value of services in the national economy, and the capital's share in the digital sector approaches 90% .

Bulgaria's regional development remains very uneven, and the recovery from the covid crisis in 2021 rearranges the ranking, especially among the least developed regions.

NSI publishes the population census data on daily labor migration, that is, on the location of the workplace of employed persons as of September 7, 2021. This snapshot of daily labor migration, which we receive once every ten years, provides very important information about economic processes in the country.

Against the background of the continued rise in consumer prices, measures to increase incomes and purchasing power take center stage in the parliamentary debate. Leading at this stage is the proposal for an aggressive increase in the minimum wage, which threatens to even increase inflationary pressure. This text examines the dimensions of the impact of price growth on workers' wages both regionally and across economic activities.

The gross added value (GVA) per capita[1] in 2020 by region varies from nearly BGN 35,000 in Sofia (the capital) to under BGN 8,000 in Silistra. The economy of Sofia differs significantly from all others and is strongly dominated by services, which bring 86% of the added value in the capital.

Since 2012, the Institute for Market Economy presents the only study of its scale and depth on the social and economic condition of the regions in Bulgaria. The regional profiles are based on 68 indicators representing the real picture in the 28 regions. Over the past decade, numerous challenges have changed the country's economic and social map – slowing investment and growth, the pandemic and subsequent recession, rapid recovery, political instability, the war in Ukraine and the energy crisis in Europe. These periods have a different manifestation at the local level, they test the potential for local coping and response, they allow some regions to advance in their development, but in the end the differences between the areas remain, and the gap between the capital and the countryside, between the large and the small, between the developed and the poor did not shrink significantly. More generally, the economic imbalances between Northern and Southern Bulgaria are determined by the smaller scale of the economic centers in the North and weaker connectivity.

For more than ten years, the Institute for Market Economy presents the only study of its scale and depth on the social and economic condition of the regions in Bulgaria. The regional profiles of the IPI are based on 68 indicators that present the real picture in the 28 regions of the country and allow to deepen the conversation about regional development and the challenges facing local authorities. The focus of this year's presentation falls on the real demographic conditions at the local level, which supersede the latest population census.