According to the book's editor and IJF director, Katarina Ott, the authors of the book are agreed that there if a need to implement reforms in the legislation, judiciary, and public administration, as well as to restructure problematic economic sectors - agriculture, the shipbuilding industry, and infrastructure and tourism.
This would completely liberalise the Croatian market and ensure the necessary institutional environment for the development of the economy, which according to current indicators is capable of being more successful.
Ott said that although it was slowed down, the economic growth rate in Croatia was at a decent level in relation to both new and old EU members, and the same goes for the inflation rate, budgetary and foreign trade deficit, and the level of tax burdens.
The reforms should not be affected by the postponement of EU entry talks, regardless of how negative political effects that event could have produced, Ott said. She added that the process of Croatia's integration with the EU would mostly depend on the government's ability to implement the reforms in a credible manner and the citizens' readiness to endure them.
The publication contains the results of a three-year project during which a group of Croatian researchers followed Croatia's preparations for accession to the EU from the aspects of trade, labour market, social policy, capital and real estate market, tourism, urban planing, regional policy, etc. Each of these areas will be discussed at separate workshops to be organised by the IJF.
The book contains works by 12 authors from Zagreb's Economics Institute, the Croatian National Bank, the Zagreb Law School, the Institute for Public Finances, the Council for the Regulation of Power Sectors, the Faculty of Economics and Tourism from Pula, several ministries, and the Bank for International Settlements from Basel.