The Foreign Investors Council in Latvia (FICIL), a close advocacy partner of AmCham, launched online event the Sentiment Index on April 26. During the event were announced the key results from the FICIL Sentiment Index 2023, delivered by Prof. Arnis Sauka, and from the Business and Investment Climate survey, conducted by the German-Baltic Chamber of Commerce. Afterwards, a panel discussion with the Minister of Economics, Minister of Finance and public sector officials.

Zlata Elksniņa-Zaščirinska, the Chairperson of the FICIL Board, informed about the long-standing social and economic reforms that are urgently needed. These reforms require political will, consistent funding, new technologies, processes and people that can implement them. To ensure successful implementation of these reforms, the public administration should lower its dependence on EU funding and stimulate digitalisation to become more efficient.

Arnis Sauka, SSE professor and FICIL member, indicated that the Sentiment Index research findings are not designed to criticise the government, but to help the policymakers identify issues that are critical for the investors and entrepreneurs in Latvia.

This year’s research results highlight that Latvia is falling behind on indicators that are related to development, such as innovation ecosystem, infrastructure, education, technologies and productivity. In addition, other Baltic States provide more measures to attract investment, have a more efficient public administration and more impactful policies. What is urgently needed is to invest in science and education, simultaneously fighting the shadow economy.