IMF: Slovakia Should Achieve Balance Budget by 2020
Bratislava, July 26 (TASR) – The pace of Slovakia’s economic growth is set to approach 4 percent in the next few years, driven mainly by domestic consumption and a record employment rate, TASR learnt from the latest forecast of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) on Thursday.
According to the Finance Ministry, the IMF prognosis confirms good prospects for the Slovak economy.
The rapid economic growth and increased efficiency of public finances have helped to reduce the public administration deficit over the past few years. The IMF expects Slovakia to see a balanced budget in 2020 thanks to which a sufficient fiscal pillow will be created to handle unexpected macroeconomic shocks.
The institution further praised Slovakia for the results achieved in boosting efficiency in collecting value-added tax (VAT), and it sees further room for improvement in this area. The implementation of the Value for Money project is also viewed as a positive measure by the IMF.
As for structural policies, these should focus on increasing employment among disadvantaged groups and women on the labour market and boosting the quality of education. The IMF recommends that disadvantaged groups should be supported through active labour market policies, in particular by training programmes directed at these groups. In order to better synchronise women’s family life with their careers, the organisation recommends increasing the number of childcare facilities.
Regarding education, there’s a need to make the teaching profession more attractive, to strengthen vocational education and to improve the school results of marginalised communities by introducing mandatory pre-school education for them.
Improvements in these areas along with higher-quality public institutions should boost long-term sustainable growth in Slovakia’s economy, stated the IMF.
