Q: Croatia has made headlines in 2017 with the troubles at its largest retailer, Agrokor. Some experts assume the potential economic impact on the country will be significant, and talk of a potential widening of the government deficit by 0.6 percentage points. How significant a risk do you assess Agrokor to be for Croatia’s economy?
A: We’re expecting the impact of Agrokor’s restructuring on economic activity to remain modest. Our current forecast for gross domestic product [GDP] growth in 2017 of 3% – which incorporates the impact of the restructuring – is the same as the one we had before Agrokor’s troubles emerged. Had there been no Agrokor case, growth in 2017 would probably exceed 3%, which gives our assessment of Agrokor in terms of impact on growth of 0.3 to 0.4 percentage points.