August 25 (SeeNews) - Bulgaria is in the process of approving 54 investment applications worth a total of 2.2 billion levs ($1.12 billion/1.12 billion euro), which will create over 4,500 new jobs, the ministry of innovation said on Thursday.
Invest Bulgaria, the state agency in charge of facilitating foreign investments in the country, is prioritising a major investment in northern Bulgaria of 880 million levs, the ministry said in a press release.
The unnamed company will make an investment in the central part of northern Bulgaria and its output will be predominantly exported in the European Union.
Over the past two months alone, Invest Bulgaria has received new applications for over 1.6 billion levs in investment projects, leading to some 1,000 job openings.
As of today, eleven projects worth an aggregate 231 million levs for over 1,500 new jobs have been approved by the agency, according to the statement.
Two of those, worth about 85 million levs each, foresee the construction of a plant for 3D endoscopes in Parvomay as well as an electric bicycle factory near Plovdiv.
Work is currently underway to shorten the investment application process to 8 weeks from the current 6 months.
Invest Bulgaria is in contact with large global battery makers with a view to attracting production capacity to the country, with potential capacity building not ruled out as early as next year, the ministry added.
Locating land for investment purposes is one of the major hurdles to foreign investors which Invest Bulgaria is working to solve at present. Invest Bulgaria provides two types of incentives for eligible applicants depending on the investment class, of 32 million levs and 16 million levs respectively, as well as administrative and institutional support and help with the acquisition of ownership or real rights over private state or municipal property, according to its website.
Net foreign direct investment (FDI) into Bulgaria grew by 289.2 million euro ($288.6 million) in the January-June period, with Austria accounting for the largest inflow, of 164.8 million euro, most recent data from the central bank shows.
(1 euro = 1.95583 levs)