Croatia’s public debt to grow without reforms

Croatia's public debt will continue to grow without structural reforms and economic growth, financial expert said on Saturday after Fitch Ratings downgraded the country's credit rating.
Fitch Ratings on Friday downgraded Croatia's long-term foreign currency Issuer Default Rating (IDR) to "BB" from "BB+" and local currency IDR to "BB+" from "BBB-" with an outlooks of stable.
Stojic, the head of the Hypo Alpe Adria Bank's Economic Research Department, said the downgrade mainly resulted from unsustainable movement of the public debt, the Croatian News Agency Hina reported.
The share of the public debt in gross domestic product (GDP) will continue to grow unless implementing structural reforms and unless the country turns to a direction which would increase a potential economic growth, he said.
He said he would revise his expectation on Croatia's economy shrinkage of this year, increasing previous assessment of 0.7 percent to 1 percent.