November 13 (SeeNews) - The Croatian central bank expects the country's economic growth to slow down to some 5.1% next year, after an expected 5.9% for 2007, while annual average inflation would speed up to 4.7% from a projected 2.8% for this year.
"There are no monetary hindrances to the gross domestic product (GDP) growth accelerating as much as 5.9% [this year] from 4.8% in 2006," central bank governor Zeljko Rohatinski said in a Tuesday statement.
According to Rohatinski, the annual inflation in October will be some 4.2%, while in December it might be around 4.7%.
Year-on-year, consumer price inflation accelerated to 3.9% in September from 2.6% in August, the highest since June 2006.
"This will partially impact the average annual growth rate of 2.8% of 2007, but due to the high yield of 2.5%, will significantly determine the average inflation rate of 4.7% in 2008. This will be the highest rate since 2000," Rohatinski said.
He added that the current account deficit would widen to 8.6% of GDP this year from 7.7% of GDP in 2006, while in 2008 it will shrink to 8.2% of GDP.