A green vision for Slovakia: The country lacks a clearly defined strategy

In Slovakia, a clearly defined state strategy for the sustainable development of the country, which would be able to respond to current challenges, is missing. In order for it to be successful, it needs legislative certainty and predictability. In the discussion A Green Vision for Slovakia, organised by the Slovak Climate Initiative (SKI), Ľubomír Andrassy, President of the Supreme Audit Office (NKÚ) of the SR, Ján Biznár, Vice-President of the Association of Industrial Unions and Transport (APZD), and Matej Horňák, analyst of Slovenská sporiteľňa, agreed on this.

„The basic precondition for the strategy to be implemented and to be successful must be a sustainable and predictable environment, and there must be legislative certainty,“ Andrassy evaluated in the discussion. An example of unpredictable legislation, according to him, is the introduction of the transaction tax.

He recalled that the worst thing for a strategy is distrust. „We chaotically change one goal after another and often have goals described very nicely verbally in strategies, but we do not have measurable indicators,“ said Andrassy.

The participants in the discussion evaluated that the country lacks a leader in the preparation of the strategy and that departmentalism prevails here. According to analyst Matej Horňák, Slovakia lacks a vision of where it sees itself in a few years.

„We need to agree on where we want to be in those 25, 30, 50 years. Because in one strategy we want this, in another that, in a third that, depending on which ministry is doing it, each has its own opinion on how to approach the topic. As long as we do not have one goal that we all want to run towards, we can all sprint, but we are not going in one direction, so we will not meet there anyway,“ said Horňák.

One of the areas of strategic planning is also healthy public finances, which the state is currently trying to put in order through consolidation. In the first year this is focused mainly on the revenue part of the budget. According to Ján Biznár from APZD, depression currently prevails in Slovakia and entrepreneurs are leaving the country. According to him, there is almost no support for the business environment here. He recalled that as an association they did not agree with such consolidation and perceive that the consolidation is rather on the revenue side and does not bring savings in expenditures. According to Andrassy, the consolidation in the revenue part of the budget has already reached the edge and it is necessary to look for a way to save on the state's expenditures.

Source: TASR