Macedonia will have to save more What are your expectations for the Macedonian economy in 2013, which is expected to be perhaps more difficult and more turbulent than this year? What, according to you, will be the biggest economic challenges and problems next year? It will be another year full of uncertainty for the world and especially for the European economy. Thus, the export demand for Macedonian products is unlikely to improve. So, we cannot expect that to boost economic growth. However, our expectation for the economic growth in Macedonia is to be much better than this year, driven by diversification of the production into new export-oriented facilities that started to work this year, or will start to work in the next year, as well as infrastructural facilities for which funding has already been secured from foreign sources. Both politicians and economists globally are of a divided opinion in terms of the economic policy that should be conducted in order to emerge from the crisis. Some advocate austerity, others encourage spending to stimulate growth. Which policy you prefer and think is right for Macedonia? According to me, those are “false” discussions. If a country has a room for increased spending, certainly now is the time to stimulate the economy. But unfortunately, there are not many such countries worldwide. Developed economies were spending more than they could afford for years, and now they do not have any room for fiscal stimulus left.
At the moment we are sure that risks to price stability undermining are eliminated, we will apply monetary measures appropriate for the slower economic growth. Маy pressures be coming from the fiscal policy? So far, they have not, and I hope it will remain that way. The best confirmation of that are the balances in the economy. After all, exactly because of that, we had room for the so far most relaxed monetary policy without jeopardizing the stability of prices, Denar exchange rate and the banking system. Banks’ non-performing loans will decrease This year, liquidity was the biggest problem of the companies. The figures showed that the indebtedness in the real sector is huge, over Euro 5 billion, with the country’s debt to the companies being over Euro 220 million. In such circumstances, banks have reduced lending to firms to a minimum and they struggle with the growth of bad loans. Can we expect the situation to improve? In the statistics that are known to me I have not found such figures. However, when economic growth and exports slow down and budgetary payments are late, usually the liquidity of companies deteriorates. Therefore they are late in the settlement of obligations to the banks. Despite that, non-performing loans of the Macedonian banks amount to about 10 percent, which is the lowest share in the region from Slovenia to Greece. Announced debt repayments from the budget will contribute to the reduction of the debts among companies, and finally debts toward the banks.