Bulgaria 3rd in EU by Economic Slowdown

During the second quarter of 2010, GDP in the Eurozone increased by 1%. File photo

Bulgaria ranks third in the European Union by the slowdown of its economy, according to data published Friday by Eurostat, the statistical office of the European Union.

The country is registering a drop of its Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of 1.5% for April-June on a yearly basis. Only Greece and Latvia register larger shrinking – of 3.5% and 3.9% respectively.

Meanwhile, GDP increased by 1.0% in both the Eurozone and the EU during the second quarter of 2010, compared with the previous quarter. In the first quarter of 2010, growth rates were +0.2% in both zones.

Compared with the same quarter of the previous year, seasonally adjusted GDP increased by 1.7% in both the Eurozone and the EU in the second quarter of 2010, after +0.6% and +0.5% respectively in the previous quarter.

The growth is attributed to the recovery of the leading economies in Europe. The strongest one – Germany, registered an increase of 2.2% for the second quarter of 2010, and 3.7% on yearly basis. For France the data is 0.6% and 1.7% respectively.

On yearly basis, Slovakia shows the strongest economic growth of 4.9%, followed by Germany (3.7%) and Sweden (3.6%)

Data was not available for Romania.

In comparison, during the second quarter of 2010, the US GDP increased by 0.6% compared with the previous quarter, after +0.9% in the first quarter of 2010. US GDP rose by 3.2% compared with the same quarter of the previous year (+2.4% in the previous quarter).

Also on Friday, the Bulgarian National Statistics Institute published their own data, showing again a drop in the country's GDP of 1.5% during the second quarter of 2010.

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