ATHENS, June 30 (Reuters) – Greece’s economy will grow
by 2.2% in 2023, the country’s central bank said on Friday,
confirming its previous forecast and urging the re-elected
conservative government to continue pushing ahead with reforms.
The central bank said in its monetary policy report that
growth was expected to reach 3% in 2024 and 2.7% in 2025, “if
the geopolitical crisis de-escalates, energy prices continue to
drop and the negative impact of the monetary policy’s tightening
on the euro zone’s economy is contained.”
The biggest challenge for Greece’s economic policy was
regaining an investment grade credit rating, it said. Prime
Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis, who stormed to victory in a
national election on Sunday, has promised to help Greece regain
that investment status within the year.
The bank added that reducing the country’s current account
deficit was also a significant challenge. Greece emerged from
international bailouts in 2018, nearly a decade after a debt
crisis forced it to seek financial aid from its European peers
and the International Monetary Fund to stay afloat.
Its 2022 current account deficit, at 9.7% of economic
output, was mainly due to the increased energy prices and was
expected to decline to 7% of GDP in 2023, the bank said.
Greece needs the implementation of prudent economic policy
to achieve annual primary surpluses of around 2% of GDP, it
added.
“Economic policymakers need to show accountability and
commitment to preserve the sacrifices of the past decade and
continue the progress achieved,” the central bank report said.
(Reporting by Lefteris Papadimas; Writing by Renee Maltezou;
Editing by Kim Coghill)
