Suker said the new law on the matter could be expected in parliamentary procedure by the end of this year.
He told the conference, which gathered some 200 participants, that the government would soon start uniting the monitoring of the non-banking financial sector and that an agency would be set up in charge of this task.
The minister also conceded that non-competitiveness of labour prices in Croatia was evident to the greatest extent in burdens which employers had to pay as contributions for pension and health insurance, which amount to 90 percent of the entire burden on the gross salary, with 10 percent falling into the category of taxes.
He added that the pension and health insurance contributions brought about 40 billion kuna annually, making up some 50 percent of the original revenues of the state budget.
Suker said that business people were dissatisfied with the share of contributions in the labour price, but that recipients of pensions and health insurance beneficiaries were also dissatisfied with pensions and public health services. This puts the government and the finance ministry in an unenviable position, he said, adding that this was an area in which insurance companies could be engaged.
HGK director Nadan Vidosevic said Croatia still had a bank-centric system, which he added should be changed.
In Croatia there are 25 insurance companies and one re-insurance society. Twelve are Croatian, while 14 are in majority Croatian ownership. Domestic insurers cover about 85 percent of the market, with foreign societies covering the rest, according to figures released by the HGK at the Opatija event.
In 2003, insurance premiums paid in Croatia totalled some 6.1 billion kuna, and the figure is likely to rise to some seven billion kuna this year.
Insurance premiums account for 3.2 percent of Croatia's Gross Domestic Product.
(1 EUR =7.5 kuna)