Ljubljana - In 2023, the EU economy will be in the grip of low or negative growth and high inflation, and export-oriented Slovenia will share the fate of most EU states, Delo newspaper says in Saturday's front-page commentary Forecasts Confirm Recession Year 2023, as it comments on the European Commission's GDP forecast, released on Friday.

It says the changes in the GDP growth forecast were expected, confirming a considerable cooling of the EU economy in 2023 and higher inflation than was expected.

Many countries will at least temporarily end up in recession although the drop in GDP forecast for 2023 is much smaller than in the pandemic year 2020.

"As small and open economy, Slovenia will share the fate of other EU members," Delo says after the Commission downgraded its growth forecast for 2023 to 0.8%, while predicting inflation will slow down to 6.5%.

Despite dropping from this year, inflation will still be by far too high next year, eating away the purchasing power of citizens, while good news is a high employment rate.

Paradoxically, however, the relatively high inflation will at least temporarily make the country's debt, incurred at fixed interest rates, sustainable.

Brussels estimates that Slovenia's debt-to-GDP ratio will remain below 70% over the next two years and thus below the EU average, despite the large fiscal deficits that are expected to accumulate in 2022, 2023 and 2024.

This could help Slovenia avoid being on the radar of financial markets, says Delo, although it admits there are many unknowns, including additional social, energy, wage and other public costs the government plans to mitigate the crisis and the tax reform announced for next year.