The premier Ingrida Simonyte says that he is not so sure that the country's economy will inevitably stop growing. She notes that neither the Bank of Lithuania nor the Ministry of Finance predicts negative economic growth next year.
"Now a lot of people are talking about a recession, but there is no recession in any of the official forecasts at the moment. Does this mean there won't be one? It may not be there. But there is a possibility that it will happen", said I. Šimonytė in an interview with Elta.
However, the Prime Minister agrees that it will not be possible to fix a fast economy in the coming years.
"The economy will grow really moderately. We will definitely not see 5 percent. growth as we saw last year when everything seemed to be growing and blooming. The uncertainty is very high, because the winter will be really hard", she believes.
According to the Prime Minister, several separate factors will determine the slowed prospects of the Lithuanian economy.
"Central banks will increase interest rates. We cannot predict what the Chinese Communist Party's actions will be as it continues to manage the pandemic. It seems to be the only country left with a strict understanding of what needs to be done. This has consequences not only for the health of the Chinese people, but for the entire world economy. Plus, the war. It's obvious that it all adds up to one pile. All this needs to be seen", explained I. Šimonytė.
In June, the Ministry of Finance predicted that the country's gross domestic product (GDP) would grow by 1,6 percent. Next year, the growth should be 2,1 percent, and in 2024 GDP should increase by 3 percent.
Leonardas Marcinkevičius (ELTA)
