Athens Macedonian News Agency: News in English, 17-02-15

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From: The Athens News Agency at <http://www.ana.gr/>

CONTENTS

[01] Final data on 2016 primary surplus to be published in April - ELSTAT chief

[02] Farmers from Central Macedonia disappointed after meeting with gov't officials

[01] Final data on 2016 primary surplus to be published in April - ELSTAT chief

"We will be able to know what the final reading is on the primary surplus on April 21. We are in talks with Eurostat to see the new data that will be available, so I can answer if the current forecasts are confirmed. These will have to be confirmed by the final census process in September 2017. We do not make forecasts, but short-term estimates," Thanasis Thanopoulos told the committee, adding the available data are preliminary and may or may not be revised in April.

The ELSTAT head also informed the committee that an official from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) will be sent as an observer during the recording of the annual fiscal data.

"During the last visit of a Eurostat team to Athens, we were asked to have an IMF observer. For reasons of transparency, we gladly accepted to have an observer because we have nothing to fear, both in terms of our sources as for the methods used by ELSTAT," he said.

Responding to a question by New Democracy MP Christos Staikouras who cited an IMF report claiming there was political interference in the work of the authority, Thanopoulos said the issue is technical.

"You could say were over-optimistic compared to last April. In any case, our main concern is to integrate any information in our data even if it is an unpleasant number, such as the lower GDP, which is bad news. I have never had any political interference so far. I consider that very positive and I hope it continues in the future," he said.

[02] Farmers from Central Macedonia disappointed after meeting with gov't officials

"We raised specific issues and they answered us as if they were talking to party members of the opposition," the member of the coordinating committee for Central Macedonia, Achileas Kambouris, told the Athens-Macedonian News Agency, after meeting with government Vice-President Yannis Dragasakis and officials from the ministries of finance, labour, energy and agricultural development.

"Concerning farmers' social security and taxation, from the beginning of the conversation they told us the Greek government cannot do anything because there is no money, while on the other issues we raised, we either received promises, or they replied generally and vaguely," he added.

Commenting on the same meeting, Mavroudis Mintsioudis, member of the coordinating committee for Central Macedonia, said taxation and social security issues "were not even touched upon" as government officials told them there cannot be any changes "as the country has bailout commitments".

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