Italy to invest €3 billion in bulgaria by 2020

The next ten years will see investments by Italian companies in Bulgaria amount to €1-3 billion...

This figure was revealed by Massimo Bartocci, the head of Italian business association in Bulgaria, Confindustria Bulgaria, at a special news conference, which announced that the General Assembly of Confindustria Balcani, the Union of Italian business associations in the Balkan countries, will take place in Sofia on October 13, 2010.

"The fact that we chose the Bulgarian capital Sofia for the meeting of Confindustria Balcani demonstrates Bulgaria's major role in the region, the dynamics of Italian companies working in the country, and its economic potential," Bartocci said.

Data of Confindustria Balcani shows that there are currently 800 Italian businesses that are active in Bulgaria. On this criteria, Bulgaria ranks second in the region after Romania, which boasts 4 000 Italian companies - a development seen much as a result of the fact that firms from Northern Italy started outsourcing some operations in Romania as early as the mid 1990s. Albania and Serbia come in next with about 300 active Italian businesses each.

Confindustria Bulgaria, which unites about 200 enterprises representing a total investment of EUR 2 B, with an annual turnover of EUR 1.3 B, and 20 000 Bulgarian employees, expects that by 2020 the number of Italian companies operating in the country will grow by 20-30% reaching at least 1000.

"Thinking about the Balkans as an organic and integrated reality is one of the keys for the future development of the countries from the region, which presents a strategically important market on the European and global stage. Italian entrepreneurship wants to play a central role in this development," Bartocci declared.

Topics related with Italy's investments and trade in the Balkans will be the focus of the general assembly meeting of Confindustria Balcani in Sofia on October 13. The meeting will be attended by representatives of Italian business associations and companies active in Romania, Bulgaria, Albania, Serbia, Croatia, Montenegro, Macedonia, Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Source: Sofia News Agency