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She made the announcement as she addressed a business lunch organised by Deloitte's SheXO Club in Koper on Saturday ahead of a match between the national women's football teams of Slovenia and Germany.

The meeting was primarily aimed at boosting business ties between the countries and was also attended by German Foreign Ministry State Secretary Cornelia Pieper, who called for reforms in all EU countries to boost competitiveness and enable the EU to keep abreast with new global centres of power.

Pieper also voiced her conviction that Slovenia must persevere with privatisation, so that business could be freed of restrictions of state ownership, which she said was also in Slovenia's interest.

Bratušek identified the effort to increase foreign direct investment as her government's priority, along with stabilisation of the banking system and fiscal consolidation.

She listed a healthy industrial base, the well-developed infrastructure, access to regional markets and educated labour force as advantages that Slovenia can offer to prospective investors.

The PM also pledged that privatisation would be conducted via transparent public calls and said priority would be given to strategic partners that showed interest in long-term presence and offered solid development plans.

Bratušek also told the event Slovenia's economy was showing first signs of recovery, but that it would take a while before the process could be completed.

She repeated that Slovenia had lost too much time in delaying reforms, something that she juxtaposed to the situation in Germany, which she said had implemented reforms on time and was ready when the crisis kicked in.

The PM also said that her government knew exactly what needed to be done, and was aware it needed to be done for the sake of Slovenia rather than because of external pressure.

She said her government started its term as damage-control team, and that reforms had been taken to stabilise the economy, but that the job was far from being done.