site.btaBulgaria Places 10th out of 125 Countries in Terms of Budget Transparency

Bulgaria raised its budget transparency rating in 2023, shows data from the 9th Open Budget Survey conducted by the International Budget Partnership, published on May 29.

The assessment of Bulgaria's budget transparency from the survey increased to 79 points compared to 71 points in the previous 2021 survey. According to the evaluation methodology, this country falls into the second group of countries with a score between 61 and 80, which are considered to provide "significant information" about the budget. This rating places Bulgaria in 10th place out of 125 countries participating in the survey. Bulgaria has participated in the Open Budget Survey since 2006, when it received a budget transparency score of 47 points, and with each subsequent reading, the country has noted a steady improvement.

The Open Budget Index is the only international independent comparative study of budget transparency that assesses the extent to which governments in 125 countries around the world provide the public with timely and detailed budget information. The index covers the procedures for drawing up, adopting, implementing and reporting the budget, as well as the responsibilities of other institutions such as the Audit Office and the legislature in the budget process.
In general, the organization's assessment is that the government in Bulgaria provides publicly available information about the budget in a sufficient quantity and quality through the eight types of key budget documents that are subject to assessment. The present result is also an assessment of the efforts of the government and the Ministry of Finance to provide more information in the budget documents and easy access to them in a format understandable to the general public when it comes to the management of public finances.