EU Commission raises economic forecast for Poland in 2021

The European Commission on Wednesday increased the GDP forecast for Poland in 2021 from 3,1 percent to 4 percent. The EU executive also said Poland's GDP would jump up by 5,4 percent in 2022.

"As the pandemic-related restrictions are gradually lifted, the economy should recover in 2021 and 2022, supported by pent-up consumer demand and the inflow of funds from Next Generation EU" - reads the EU statement.

The EU officials also estimate that inflation in Poland in 2021 will be at 3,5 percent, and at 2,9 percent in 2022. The inflation marker stood at 3,7 percent in 2020.

"The unemployment rate is projected to post a moderate increase in 2021 to 3.5%, and to gradually decrease again in 2022 to 3.3%" - the EU Commission forecasts. If it turned out to be true, it would be the lowest unemployment rate in the whole bloc.

Furthermore, the document says that "the Polish labour market proved resilient to the crisis in 2020, supported by government aid packages which encouraged cutting worktime rather than jobs". "Government support is expected to continue in 2021, and once the restrictions are lifted and economic conditions are improved, the demand for labour will gradually increase" - we read.

"According to the latest forecasts, last year's recession in Poland was one of the shallowest among EU countries," Poland's Minister of Finance Tadeusz Kościński said on Wednesday. "A better result was achieved only by Ireland, Lithuania and Luxembourg. That confirms that the Polish economy coped relatively well with the hard times of the pandemic" - he added.

"The EC expects a fall in the nominal deficit in 2021-22, earlier than the Ministry of Finance assumed, by respectively 4.3 percent of GDP and 2.3 percent of GDP against 7 percent of GDP in 2020," minister Kościński said.

READ THE FULL EU COMMISSION ECONOMIC FORECAST FOR POLAND HERE