WARSAW: Poland's government on Tuesday approved the key planks of the country's 2012 budget, saying it expected the economy to expand by 4.0 percent next year.
In a statement after a cabinet meeting, the government also forecast 3.7 percent growth in 2013 and 3.9 percent in 2014.
Poland joined the European Union in 2004, 15 years after the fall of its communist regime paved the way for sweeping market reforms.
With 38 million people, it was the largest ex-communist economy to join the EU in the bloc's "big-bang" expansion.
As the rest of the 27-nation European Union was battered by the slump, Poland was unique in 2009 in posting economic growth of 1.7 percent compared with 2008.
Output expanded by 3.8 percent in 2010. This year's official forecast is 3.5-4.0 percent.
Those figures and the forecasts issued Tuesday still lag behind recent performances, however.
In 2008, for example, Poland's economy expanded by 5.0 percent, and growth topped 6.0 percent in the two previous years.
Also on Tuesday, the government said it expected annual average inflation to be 2.8 percent in 2012, and 2.5 percent in both 2013 and 2014.
Unemployment, currently around 13 percent, should fall to 10 percent in 2012, 9.3 percent in 2013 and 8.5 percent in 2014, it said.
Poland long had one of the highest unemployment rates in the EU despite its solid economic performance -- although a handful of other member states far outstripped it amid the global economic crisis.
Experts blame a shortfall of training programmes to boost Polish job-seekers' chances, housing problems for people who try to move out of high unemployment areas and the role of the "grey" economy.
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