Croatia is determined to eventually join the eurozone after its expected entry to the European Union in 2013, although the debt crisis in the currency bloc makes it difficult to estimate a timeframe, its finance minister said on Friday.
"The euro is a natural choice for Croatia since banks' and corporate balance sheets are now mainly in euros, 80 percent of retail deposits are in euros or other foreign currency," Martina Dalic told Reuters on the sidelines of an economic forum in Poland."Of course, I think the monetary union needs more rethinking and reforming, taking into consideration the experiences of the last 10 years, but we don't have much room for second thoughts. The fate of the euro will be the fate of our banks," she added.
Dalic said the former Yugoslav republic did not yet have a detailed euro road map and said the euro zone's debt problems, which have forced Greece, Ireland and Portugal to seek EU/IMF bailouts, meant it was difficult to say when Croatia could join.
Like many eurozone members, Croatia has been struggling to restore growth after its economy contracted over the last two years. This year the government forecasts growth of 1.5 percent, higher than analysts' and the International Monetary Fund's forecast of just 1 percent.
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