Costa ensures the deficit below the european target of 2.5% – the Public.en

The prime minister gave on Wednesday the promulgation by the President of the Republic State Budget for 2017 among the factors of political stability and ensured that the deficit this year will be below 2.5%, the european target.

António Costa was speaking before the members of the Board of the Diaspora of the Portuguese Communities, in São Bento, in Lisbon, in a speech also said that the country’s exports will grow 6% in 2016. “Fortunately, our exports have found new paths, and will grow more than 6%. As in the last two decades all of the years the exports have grown, this means that each year grows, it is the same that climb the most difficult part of the mountain,” he advocated.

“For the first time we will have our budget deficit to comply with the rules of the European Union. Now that you have a few days to the end of the year, we can already say with peace of mind and security that the deficit will be even below 2.5%, the limit that had been set by the European Commission. We will be below, with comfort, 2.5%”, underlined the leader of the executive.

Having at his side the minister of Foreign Affairs, Augusto Santos Silva, and the honorary president of the Board of the Diaspora of the Portuguese Communities, the businessman Philip Button, António Costa referred also to the decision announced by the head of State, Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa, to enact the State Budget for 2017. “We are a country that enjoys healthy political stability. Still today the President of the Republic enacted the Budget in 2017, which means that up to half of the legislature, the budgetary policy is defined, approved, and stabilized. Therefore, with serenity, we will running this political transition,” added the prime minister.

Before the members of the Board of the Diaspora, the prime minister maintained that the 2016 “was a turning-point in economic Portugal”, in addition the country has recorded international successes in sport (Euro France Football) and political (election of António Guterres to the post of secretary-general of the United Nations).

Still on the progress of the country on the economic front, the leader of the executive said that several foreign companies located in Portugal are announcing expansion plans” and that other firms, not yet installed in the country, have expressed interest to invest in the domestic market. “We are one of the five countries considered to be more secure at the global level, which fills us with pride, but also concern with what happens to the outside world. All this creates conditions to strengthen confidence in the Portuguese economy and its ability to meet the challenges of the future”, said António Costa.

according To the prime minister, in a world surrounded by uncertainties, “stability is an essential factor for the confidence in the investment and for the country to concentrate on the essential: The execution of the National Programme of Reforms to solve the structural problems of Portugal”.

“so, in this moment of turning, more than ever it is important to mobilize our diaspora, not only to motivate in relation to Portugal, but also because it is an exceptional channel of transmission for the different communities in which they operate on what is the reality effective in the country”, he concluded.