Bulgaria should take timely measures for adaptation to climate change, an analysis of the World Bank reads. Otherwise, this country’s economic growth will slow down, the World Bank warns. If this country fails to take the necessary measures to adapt to the climate changes, the growth of its gross domestic product will fall significantly by 2050. Moreover, Bulgaria will register negative economic growth (recession) after 2050. That is why a World Bank team has been developing a national strategy for adaptation to climate changes. The National Climate Change Adaptation Strategy and Action Plan will be presented to the Bulgarian government until the end of September this year, the web site of the Bulgarian Ministry of Environment and Water informs. The team of the international financial institution works with models and methods used in other EU member states during the development of the project. The World Bank analyses the possible effects of the climate changes in 9 key sectors of the national economy-agriculture, biodiversity, power generation, forests, healthcare, transport, urban development, tourism and waters. The World Bank’s experts conclude that the need to adapt to climate change should henceforth be the basis of making investment and managerial decisions in Bulgaria. The analyses also show that each Euro invested in policies aimed at reducing the impact of the climate changes pays off. For instance, each Euro invested in agriculture will have a EUR 4 return, if the average annual temperatures rise by 4 degrees Celsius by 2050. If this negative scenario occurs and the average temperatures increase with 4C, the measures undertaken by this country to adapt to climate changes would reduce the negative impact on the economic growth from 4.3% to 2.6% of the GDP. However, if Bulgaria does not take measures for adaptation  to climate changes, it would suffer other negative consequences. For example, prices in Bulgaria will increase, the real incomes will fall and as a result the poverty levels will rise. By emphasizing the benefits of adapting to climate change the analysis of the World Bank comes to the general conclusion that in any case it can significantly mitigate their adverse effects.

Editor: Stoimen Pavlov

English version: Kostadin Atanasov