By entering the Eurozone, Bulgaria will have a competitive advantage over Romania in all areas, especially in tourism.
This was stated last night on the air of Digi 24 TV by former Romanian Prime Minister Teodor Stolojan, commenting on the economic situation in Romania, quoted by dariknews.bg.
“At the end of this year you will see what kind of international tourism Bulgaria had and what kind of tourism Romania will have&rdquo, said Teodor Stolojan, who was Prime Minister of Romania in the period 1991-1992.
The former Prime Minister from the ranks of the National Liberal Party supports Romania's entry into the eurozone and recalled that he has always advocated for this.
Romania is officially obliged to adopt the euro according to the Treaty on Accession to the European Union, but currently there is no timetable for achieving this goal. Over the years since joining the EU, various Romanian governments have indicated several target dates - 2019, 2024 or 2029, but none of them has been supported by the fulfillment of the necessary conditions, Romanian media commented on Bulgaria's entry into the eurozone on January 1, 2026.
“There was incredible resistance from the banking system, with theorists trying to prove that Romania could not switch to the euro until it was sufficiently developed“, recalled Teodor Stolojan on Digi 24 and gave Croatia and Bulgaria as examples.
He commented on the economic situation in Romania and noted that the country's problem is fiscal and financial discipline.
“We, with mathematical precision, end up crashing the cart into the fence, as we did now, and these extremely painful and heavy "measures (for savings) had to be taken for the Romanian population and not only for them, but also for Romanian companies. We have this trait, which is why I have always advocated for Romania to switch to the euro as soon as possible," the Romanian politician shared.
According to him, in order to achieve this goal, Romania must achieve macroeconomic balance, not a level of development.
„Croatia joined the euro, at that time having a lower gross domestic product per capita than Romania“, the former prime minister noted.
He commented on the news in Romania about the switch to the euro in Bulgaria and the information that somewhere there was no euro in an ATM or that someone received change in leva.
„These are problems inherent in the initial period, until things are settled“, pointed out Teodor Stolojan. "Bulgaria will have a competitive advantage over Romania in all areas, especially in tourism. And at the end of this year you will see what international tourism Bulgaria has had and what tourism Romania will have," he concluded.
In Romania, public support for adopting the euro is around 59 percent, according to a Eurobarometer survey for the European Commission. However, the country faces the largest budget deficit in the EU, and stabilising public finances is a major obstacle to accession. Analysts quoted by Reuters say it will take several years for Romania to stabilise its finances to have a realistic prospect of joining the eurozone. Amid high inflation, austerity measures and the rise of the far right ahead of the 2028 elections, the topic of adopting the single currency is absent from mainstream public debate.
For Romania to abandon the leu, the budget deficit must not exceed 3 percent of GDP, public debt must be limited to below 60 percent of GDP, and inflation must not be more than 1.5 percentage points higher than the average of the best-performing eurozone countries. In addition, the country must have a stable exchange rate - it must have participated in the exchange rate mechanism (ERM II) for at least two years without a significant deviation from the ERM II central rate, and the long-term interest rate must not exceed by more than two percentage points the interest rate of the three best-performing member states in terms of price stability.