I decided while I was listening to all panelists that we have had enough of what is not working in Bulgaria. We had problems with our investments, we did not receive that much help from InvestBulgaria Agency. And still as already mentioned Kraft Foods has been in Bulgaria for over 15 years and has just finished a 40 million investment in a chocolate factory.
One point I would like to pick up on is ideas. We heard earlier from Minister Traykov about different impressions and ideas he has generated during a trip in the U.S. We heard about a number of options. I would like to launch a message also to the government – I think we have had enough of ideas, I think it is time to move to action.
As a business, we knew that the crisis is coming and by October 2008, we had 5 pages of ideas on how to deal with it and we started putting the ideas into actions. By April 2009, half of them were implemented and they were not enough. So, here comes the next round of ideas as we are still in a crisis.
One of the key lessons that I have personally learn in this situation is take your time to get your ideas, but then pick a few and move on.
If I have to summarize what I see, the government has come to power with a clear decision-making image, but is struggling to put ideas into action. Earlier on, uncertainty was mentioned. As in stock markets, in the business investment community uncertainty is a killer of decision making. If you read the news, there are all the time different things going on. So, if I was sitting in Chicago, New York or Shanghai, I would say “I am not sure this is where I want to invest”.