Informes Sectoriales OP - Icex

TOURISM AND RELATED SERVICES IN BULGARIA
The European Commission 2005 Report confirmed the findings of its 2004 Report
that the business environment, in particular the efficiency of the administrative and
judicial system as well as regulatory procedures, should be further improved to increase
Bulgaria’s attractiveness for investment.
Efforts to improve the business environment have continued, but many obstacles
remain and some reforms have been delayed or still need to be fully implemented.
Despite some improvements, business surveys indicate that procedures for market
entry and exit as well as contract enforcement still tend to be very time-consuming,
costly and complex. Some first steps have been taken to streamline business registration
with the adoption of the long-awaited Law on the Bulstat registry on 27 April
2005 and the ensuing adoption of a government strategy for the actual establishment
of a central register of legal entities and of an electronic register of Bulgaria.
The aim is to unify the registration of businesses with the Registry Agency under the
Ministry of Justice, to turn business registration from a court procedure into a
purely administrative procedure, and to introduce a single Bulstat number for tax
and social security purposes. These measures will be important for making business
registration simpler and more transparent, but still need to be fully implemented.
The Tax and Social Security Procedural Code which will provide for the integration of
the collection of taxes and social security contributions and thereby lay the basis for
the functioning of the National Revenue Agency also still needs to be adopted in this
context.
The project for the modernization of the land registration system has encountered
delays, although some progress in the functioning of the Cadastre Agency has been
made especially at regional level. Hardly any progress has been made to improve the
efficiency of bankruptcy procedures. Moreover, further planned amendments to the
insolvency legislation are still only in the process of preparation.
Further efforts have been made to improve the functioning of the administration and
to streamline existing regulation in line with the Law on the Restriction of Administrative
Regulation and Control on Business Activity of December 2003. The review of
existing licensing, registration and authorization regimes with a view to alleviate or
lift these regulations has continued, as well as the introduction of one-stop shops. A
majority of administrative units have tried to strengthen their service-orientation by
adopting clients’ charters and by increasing the availability of e-government services.
The Law on Investment Promotion was also amended in April 2005 lowering the
thresholds for potential investors to receive preferential treatment. However, the extent
to which these measures lead to tangible improvements in the conditions for doing
business is not always clear. A more systematic and comprehensive assessment
of the business impact of existing as well as new legislation beyond the review of
regulatory regimes mentioned above, including regulations at local level, would be
important to further improve the business environment especially for SMEs.
While the Law on the Restriction of Administrative Regulation envisages the introduction
of regulatory impact assessments, this needs to be implemented more systematically.
The same holds for the introduction of ‘silent consent’ as a general principle
in administrative procedures.
Spanish Economic and Commercial Office of the Spanish Embassy in Sofia 44