2005-02-28
President of the National Bank of Poland praises Lithuania’s economic achievements and points out the challenges in the run up to the euro
Lithuania has achieved outstanding economic results over several recent years and may be one of the first new European Union Member States to join the euro area. This was noted by Professor Leszek Balcerowicz, President of the National Bank of Poland, at a round-table discussion “Experience of Convergence and the Path to the Euro”, including the participants from public institutions, academics and financial analysts, held at the Bank of Lithuania on February 28.
The guest speaker stressed during the forum and a press briefing afterwards that fiscal discipline was of utmost importance to countries aiming to join the euro area and participate in it successfully.
Mr Balcerowicz mentioned that brave and fast economic reforms are necessary to improve the welfare of the people. The speaker reviewed the track record of various regions and post-communist countries and made a conclusion that countries, which did not reform their economies or did that slowly, lagged behind the leading countries of the world on various indicators of the quality of life.
“Recent data that I have analysed show that Lithuania is among top countries in Europe. You have nearly completed privatisation and liberalisation of the economy. Statistics show that public expenditure as a percentage of GDP has strongly declined. The biggest challenge in the future is to maintain the achieved position,” said Mr Balcerowicz while answering the questions of journalists.
He mentioned that the National Bank of Poland carried out economic research to find out what would be the benefit in joining the euro area for Poland. The results showed that economic growth would be higher by 0.2?0.4 percentage points owing just to the adoption of the euro.
The heads of both the National Bank of Poland and the Bank of Lithuania noted, at the briefing, very good mutual cooperation.
“The Bank of Lithuania and the National Bank of Poland regularly exchange important information. During this meeting we discussed the opportunities for developing our cooperation further”, said Reinoldijus Sarkinas, Chairman of the Board of the Bank of Lithuania.
Leszek Balcerowicz has been President of the National Bank of Poland since 2001. In the first non-communist Government of Poland of 1989 Mr Balcerowicz was Vice Prime Minister and Minister of Finance, he developed and implemented a brave reform plan, which transformed Poland into a market economy. A well-known economist, he also worked in the Government during subsequent years.