Bulgaria may be able to enter the euro zone by the middle of 2013, Finance Minister Simeon Djankov told Sofia-based daily 24 Chasa in an interview published on Monday (August 3rd).
"We have a chance to adopt the euro in the last year of the [government's four-year] mandate," he said.
A former World Bank chief economist, Djankov also serves as deputy prime minister in the cabinet of the centre-right Citizens for the European Development of Bulgaria (GERB), which was sworn in on July 27th.
Prior to introducing the euro as its official currency, Bulgaria must first join the European Exchange Rate Mechanism II (ERM II), a two-year currency stability test for hopefuls, currently comprised of 16 EU members.
Sofia plans to submit an application for participation in November, Djankov said last week.
"There is great uncertainty about what happens in the whole region in terms of the financial crisis," Bloomberg news agency quoted him as noting. "It doesn't affect our application, but may affect the speed with which it is considered."
Djankov believes Bulgaria will fulfil the official criteria for euro zone membership by the end of the year.
The main task now, he noted, is to keep the deficit below 3% of Gross Domestic Product (GDP), the euro zone limit.
"We are currently at 2.2-2.5% (budget deficit) ... If the deficit exceeds 3.0%, it will put off our euro zone entry by two more years," Reuters quoted him as saying.
Djankov also forecast that inflation rates will continue to drop to an annual average of 2.8% this year, down from 3.7% in June.
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