ZAGREB, 9 Feb (Hina) - Prime Minister Andrej Plenković on Wednesday announced on Twitter that the government would mitigate the impact on the citizens' standard of living with a strong package of measures given the increase in energy prices, adding that talks on support were also under way with businesses.

"We are talking with the leaders of the Croatian Employers' Association (HUP), the Croatian Chamber of Commerce (HGK) and the Croatian Chamber of Trades and Crafts (HOK) about Croatia's economic recovery, the price increase and support for business people in the challenges we are facing. The Croatian government will mitigate the impact on the citizens' standard of living with a strong package of measures due to the increase in energy prices," the prime minister wrote on Twitter.

Due to an imminent increase in the prices of gas and electricity as of 1 April, Prime Minister Plenković had earlier announced that in order to alleviate the effect of the increase of energy prices on citizens, the government would act in three segments -- social transfers, gas and electricity pricing and VAT rates.

Economy and Sustainable Development Minister Tomislav Ćorić earlier announced that the government would present its measures to mitigate the increase in energy prices in February.

In the meantime, the government on Monday issued a decree capping the prices of petroleum products, limiting the price of Eurosuper 95 to HRK 11.37 per litre, Eurodiesel to HRK 11.29 and Eurodiesel BS blue to HRK 6.5 per litre, VAT included. The prices will be valid for a maximum of 30 days.

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ZAGREB, 9 February 2022  - The Croatian Chamber of Agriculture (HPK) on Wednesday once again warned that the price of raw milk is untenable, and that its price should head towards HRK 3.5 with VAT because its price is rising much faster in the European Union than in Croatia.

HPK participated at a meeting of the CDG Milk (Civil dialogue group on milk) on Tuesday where they discussed the situation and trends surrounding the price of raw milk in the EU, chairman of the Milk Committee at HKP Igor Rešetar said.

"We saw that in countries Croatia imports milk from the most, the price of fresh milk has increased on average by 8-12% in the past year, while the price in Croatia remained the same throughout 2021," said Rešetar.

Croatia has one of the lowest raw milk price rises, yet despite all the problems last year, 428,700 tonnes of milk were delivered, which is 1.3% less than the year before. The number of dairy farmers has fallen by 500 and Croatia now has only 3,500, HPK underscored.

"The price of raw milk should be heading towards HRK 3.5 with VAT, which is the price that farmers in Italy, Austria and Poland have," said Rešetar.

Despite the Ministry of Agriculture's attempts to support the milk industry, HPK warned that the current situation is unsustainable and that further collapse could become dramatic. Croatia could be one of the rare countries left without local dairy farms.

HPK noted that milk production in Croatia is constantly on the decline. In 2015, 513,400 tonnes of milk was delivered compared to 434,200 tonnes in 2020. The situation in Slovenia is almost unchanged whereas in Serbia, it is increasing from 861,800 tonnes in 2015, to 907,700 tonnes in 2020.

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ZAGREB, 9 Feb 2022 - Social Policy Minister Josip Aladrović on Wednesday awarded 52 contracts worth HRK 29.8 million to associations that assist people with disabilities in the Zagreb area and northwestern Croatia.

Aladrović said these were the first of 135 contracts that would be signed with civil society associations across the country to finance 79 personal assistance programmes, 29 Croatian sign language interpreter/translator programmes, and 27 seeing companion programmes, "which will improve the everyday life of many of our citizens."

"We can change the perception of persons with disabilities together through concrete action, by ensuring the necessary social services, facilitating access to services and including them more equally in work and the life of the community", the minister said.

Under the new Social Welfare Act, the circle of persons entitled to caregiver status has been expanded, and allowances have been increased to HRK 4,500, adding that the hiring of persons with disabilities would also be increased through financing workshops and incentives in the labour market.

"This year alone, HRK 81 million has been invested in employment incentives and 1,109 persons with disabilities have been included, nearly 30% more than in 2020", Aladrović continued.

This year, the government will focus on two new bills, on inclusive allowance and on personal assistance, which is in Croatia's interest as a welfare state.

The minister also commented on the announcement by the Zagreb authorities that they will extend kindergarten hours to 9 pm with the help of EU funds. He said the government was already financing longer days in kindergartens via the EU Social Fund in many local communities.

"We support that decision and since kindergartens are in the remit of local authorities, we expect the City of Zagreb to do more and better", he added.

(€1 = HRK 7.5)

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ZAGREB, 9 Feb 2022 - The problem of systematic radioactive waste management in Croatia will be resolved with the construction of a radioactive waste management facility, Žarko Katić, state secretary at the Ministry of the Interior, said in parliament on Wednesday.

Speaking during a discussion on the proposal to amend the Radiological and Nuclear Safety Act, Katić said that only low and medium radioactive waste from the medicine and science industry, as well as from the Krško nuclear power plant, would be disposed of in the future facility, and not highly radioactive spent nuclear fuel.

As for the low and medium radioactive waste from Krško, it is mostly disposable material worn by workers and discarded at the end of the day, he added.

Katić said that industrial and medical radioactive waste was currently disposed of in two storage facilities in Zagreb - the Ruđer Bošković Institute and the Institute for Medical Research and Occupational Health. It currently amounts to 11.5 cubic metres and is expected to reach about 100 cubic metres by 2060.

With the waste from Krško, this amount will be an additional 1,130 cubic metres, and by the time Krško closes in 2043, it is estimated that it will have reached 1,780 cubic metres, Katić said.

MPs did not have any major objections to the proposal and, in light of the current energy crisis, a portion of them supported the use nuclear energy as clean energy.

"Nuclear energy is needed. It is clean and our future lies in nuclear energy," said Marin Miletić of the Bridge party. Darko Klasić of the Croatian Social Liberal Party (HSLS) agreed, saying that nuclear energy is "a clean, safe, competitive and low-carbon source of energy."

"The world has said yes to nuclear power plants. We need to have them because with growing consumption they are the only good, albeit not perfect, solution for now," said the Homeland Movement's Davor Dretar.

"I am sure that people in Dalmatia would not support the construction of a nuclear power station," said Social Democrat Renata Sabljar Dračevac, stressing that the use of nuclear energy in Croatia requires a national consensus.

Anka Mrak Taritaš (Civil and Liberal Alliance) also said that Croatia should declare its political view on nuclear energy.

Katić said there were three reasons why the present law needed amending - to align it with the law on the Fund for financing the decommissioning and disposal of radioactive waste and with EU directives, and to improve the system overall. He announced that a nuclear emergency response plan would be adopted soon.

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ZAGREB, 9 Feb 2022 - A tender for design documentation for a future medical research centre in Split was presented in the coastal city on Wednesday.

The project to build the centre, which will be located on the premises of the city's Križine Hospital, is worth slightly more than €80 million, including equipment.

The cost of design documentation is slightly less than HRK 8 million, with the entire amount provided by the EU.

The project partner is the Split Faculty of Medicine.

The future 15,500-square-metre Split Medical Research Centre will have eight laboratories - for human genetics, cell and tissue biology, bioinformatics, data analysis and statistics, cardiovascular and lifestyle medicine, tumors, neurodegenerative diseases and neuroscience, regenerative rehabilitation, and for the development of new drugs, devices, and clinical procedures.

The purpose of the project is the establishment of a major research-innovation structure which, officials of the KBC Split Hospital believe, will enhance the quality, scope and relevance of research activities in the field of biomedicine and health care, as well as enable integration with the joint pan-European network.

The future centre is expected to integrate research and clinical work of the Split Faculty of Medicine and the KBC Split Hospital.

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ZAGREB, 9 Feb 2022 - Close to 50% of young Croatians occasionally or frequently think about leaving the country, and their stay depends on a number of factors, which is why it is necessary to focus on the value and cultural aspects of the problem, shows a survey on the motivation of young people to emigrate and start a family.

"When it comes to the likelihood of emigration, on a scale from 1 to 10, the average response was slightly above 4, which means that young people are divided over whether they want to emigrate, but almost half of them think about leaving occasionally or frequently," World Youth Alliance Croatia (WYAC) member Domagoj Dalbello said.

This shows that a significant number of young people are considering leaving the country. However, they do not leave on impulse, but rather consider the option for some time before leaving.

"Young people want 2.4 children on average, which is higher than the average number of children in Croatia. The reason why young people do not have more children is not exclusively because they do not want children, but that there are other discouraging circumstances", Dalbello said.

Socially more active want more children, less inclined to emigrate

58% of young people vote in parliamentary elections, 65% vote in presidential elections and 60% in local elections while 7-9% never vote, depending on the type of elections. At the same time, close to 90% of young people believe participation in elections should be higher, which means that they are aware of the importance of political participation.

The survey also shows that young people who vote more are less inclined to emigrate, making political apathy and lack of belief that one can change anything, one of the emigration factors.

15% of young people are active in civil society, while 7% are active in a political party.

Youths who are more active in civil society want to have several children on average, but want to do so later in life. They also have less of a desire to emigrate.

Those active in a religious community want to have several children while younger and have a lower desire to emigrate. This means that while membership of a political party may be related with lower intentions to emigrate, it is not related to the desired number of children.

The average likelihood of emigration of young people in the public sector is 3.1 and in the private sector 4, which poses a problem in terms of economy.

Slightly more than half of young people live with their parents and those who have moved out did so mostly at the age of 18 or 19, which coincides with the age when they go to college. The survey found that the later young people leave their parents' home, the later they start their own family.

The survey also shows that young people whose relatives live abroad are more likely to emigrate. Those who want to stay mention the country's beauty and the wish to live in their homeland, while those who are more likely to emigrate cite corruption and tourism.

Expert: Public policies focus on elderly

Marin Strmota, a lecturer at the Zagreb Faculty of Economics and former secretary for demography who unexpectedly resigned from that post at a news conference in 2018, warned that the share of young people in the total population was decreasing, hence their voices were less represented.

"If the share of older citizens is growing, public policies will naturally focus on the older population because it carries more votes," he said.

He noted that one should have clearer and more specific methods of attracting young people and that surveys should also be conducted locally because not all local government units have the same potential, problems and legacy.

Asked what he considered to be a bigger problem - the emigration of young people or the unwillingness to have children of those staying in the country, Strmota said that all negative processes were present - total and natural depopulation, generational depopulation and emigration depopulation.

An advisor at the Institute for Migration and Ethnic Studies, Sanja Klempić Bogadi, said that the state focuses too much on how to stimulate the return of those who have left instead of focusing on how to keep young people who are still in the country.

The WYAC survey covered 660 young people aged 18-30 with residence in Croatia and was conducted from 23 September to 1 December 2021 via social networks and e-mail.

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ZAGREB, 9 Feb 2022 - The Supreme Court said on Wednesday that it had made two decisions "relevant for a large number of ongoing cases against banks launched by bank clients", which the Franak association welcomed, saying it expected the highest court to rule by Easter on the nullity of contracts on CHF-pegged loans as well.

The Franak association brings together former holders of loans pegged to the Swiss franc.

The Supreme Court said that in one of its two decisions, it allowed a review motion against a second-instance court ruling related to the following legal issue, whether "in an appeal against an enforcement ruling and the subsequent proceedings, to have the enforcement declared impermissible, one can insist on the circumstance that points to the nullity of the notarial act (consumer contract), which constitutes the enforcement order in the enforcement proceedings."

"This is a legal matter that requires the Croatian Supreme Court to adopt a legal position in line with the Court of the EU in the application of the Unfair Contract Terms Directive, which should result in the evolution of law through legal practice," the court said.

Franak believes this means that the Supreme Court will decide whether enforcement may be carried out if implemented on the basis of an invalid contract, but also on the basis of a contract containing invalid contractual provisions, i.e. on the basis of a partially invalid contract.

"That decision will apply to all loans with the CHF currency clause, but also to euro and kuna-denominated loans with contractual provisions on invalid interest rates," the association said.

In the other decision, the Supreme Court refused a review motion by a bank, upholding decisions by lower courts and taking the position that as the plaintiff, the bank must compensate the consumer for litigation costs regardless of the fact that the client had withdrawn the lawsuit.

Franak said this decision is not related to a decision on consumers' right to compensation after the conversion of CHF-pegged loans to euro loans, which it expects the Court of the EU will make by May.

"If, however, the Court of the EU decides that our case is not within its jurisdiction, the decision on conversion and compensation will be made by the Croatian Supreme Court, but this specific review motion has nothing to do with that either," the association said.

It expressed satisfaction that the Supreme Court president "is doing what he promised to do" and that it expected "the issue of nullity of contracts on CHF-pegged loans to be resolved by Easter."

The position of Supreme Court president is held by Radovan Dobronić, who on 4 July 2013, as a Zagreb Commercial Court judge, delivered a ruling in favour of the Consumer Protection Association which had sued eight banks with regard to the Swiss franc foreign currency clause and their unilateral decision to increase interest rates.

Dobronić said at the time that the banks had violated consumers' rights by failing to fully inform them about all the parameters necessary to decide on taking loans.

The ruling on the legal nullity of the currency clause in contracts on loans pegged to the Swiss franc, was later upheld by the High Commercial Court and its ruling was upheld by the Constitutional Court.

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ZAGREB, 9 Feb 2022 - Croatian Parliament Speaker Gordan Jandroković on Wednesday received the ambassadors to Croatia from the United Kingdom, Spain and China - Simon Derek Thomas, Alonso Dezcallar De Mazarredo and Qi Qianjin, to discuss closer cooperation with their respective countries, the parliament said in a press release.

Jandroković and British Ambassador Thomas talked about defence cooperation and partnership within the framework of NATO and economic relations. In particular, they welcomed the progress in strengthening cooperation in the IT industry, research and development, technology and smart cities, the press release stated.

They cited company, Rimac Automobili, expanding its business to Great Britain as an example of excellent cooperation in the technology sector.

Jandroković and Thomas spoke about the current situation in Ukraine, Bosnia and Herzegovina and the rest of Southeast Europe.

In his talks with Spanish Ambassador De Mazarredo, Jandroković said that relations with Spain were "very good and friendly, with a intention of intensifying in all areas of common interest."

Croatia and Spain recorded positive trade results in 2021 and good cooperation in the fields of energy, transport and tourism.

Jandroković said he was pleased with the number of Spanish tourists to Croatia last year despite the pandemic.

The newly appointed ambassador presented Jandroković with an invitation to a Spain-Croatia inter-parliamentary forum. Jandroković accepted the invitation from Spain's parliament speaker and said he hoped the forum would enable even more cooperation between the two countries.

Ambassador Qi Qianjin was on an inaugural visit to the parliament. He and Jandroković pointed out the Pelješac Bridge as the best example of cooperation, saying that the bridge would be open to traffic this year year, marking 30 years of diplomatic relations between Croatia and China.

With the aim of strengthening inter-parliamentary cooperation, Jandroković accepted an invitation to attend a video meeting with the Chairman of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress, Li Zhanshu.

In addition to important projects like the Senj wind park, an important Chinese investment project in Croatia, also discussed were other areas with the potential to strengthen economic cooperation within the China+16 Initiative.

The meeting highlighted the significance of Chinese visitors for Croatia's tourism and expressed hope for even more Chinese tourists in the years to come, the press release said.

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