Kalfin: Government Will Be a Better Partner to Business

The government will follow more often the advice of the business to make market better and climate more favorable for foreign investments, announced the Minister of Foreign Affairs Ivaylo Kalfin during a meeting with the Bulgarian Business Leaders Forum members.

Kalfin assured the business people that anti-corruption fight and efficient absorption of EU funds through closer cooperation between local authorities and private sector are the top priorities for government together with maintaining favourable public opinion towards Bulgaria in the EU member states.

‘The government has an action plan for promotion of Bulgaria's culture, politics and business in each of the 25 EU member states,' Minister Kalfin said. ‘I call upon you to lend us a helping hand in proving that EU money will be in place in Bulgaria', requested the Minister.

The Deputy PM stated that every large Bulgarian investment project abroad could rely on complete political support by the government. He also shared the opinion that the business should be involved deeper in defining the state's opinions on specific issues to be negotiated with the EC.

‘We recently had the opportunity to hand a copy of the BBLF Business Ethics Standard to Prime Minister Sergey Stanishev. During our meeting we felt willingness for partnership on behalf of the government and hope this will continue after our today's meeting with Minister Kalfin,' BBLF Chairman Maxim Behar said.

The meeting gave opportunity to representatives of companies, among which KPMG, Deloitte, nuclear power plant Kozloduy, AIMS Human Capital, Siemens, AstraZeneca, Nokia, IBM, M3 Communications Group, Inc., and the Energy Efficiency Agency, to exchange ideas for more fruitful cooperation between the state and private sector in the country and abroad.