Estimated reading time: 2 minutes
Poland will probably enjoy a small economic growth and thus avoid a recession this year, Mateusz Morawiecki, the Polish prime minister, has said.
“Most probably… we’ll avoid a recession, we’ll see economic growth, but the main European economies may indeed experience a hard landing,” Morawiecki told on Wednesday the state-owned broadcaster TVP at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.
According to the prime minister, public investment is the way out of recession. “As much investment as possible, including public investment, because it replaces what is missing – and what I regret – private investment,” Morawiecki said.
According to the prime minister, Poland’s inflation may enter a downward trend from March or April.
“It seems that thanks to declines in the prices of commodities… there is a chance that from March or April inflation will enter into a falling trend,” Morawiecki said while making a reservation that January and February will still see elevated CPI levels.
Poland’s inflation declined from the record-high level of 17.9 percent reached in October to 17.5 percent in November and 16.6 percent in December. However, a series of price hikes in January will likely give a second boost to inflation at the beginning of this year.
The prime minister also said he had been asked in Davos how the Polish government was able to raise its defence spending to four percent of GDP this year without increasing the deficit.
“It was only here that many of my interlocutors made me aware how well it is perceived and appreciated abroad,” Morawiecki said.