Bulgaria extends job retention scheme until end-2020
Bulgaria's government extended by three months until December 31 its job retention scheme introduced to cushion the impact of the coronavirus crisis, the government's press office said.
Some 750 million levs ($452.6 million/383.5 million euro) needed to implement the scheme will be provided from the country's Unemployment Fund, the government's press office said in a statement published on Monday.
The anti-crisis measures are expected to save about 200,000 jobs, the statement reads.
The wage support measure, popularly known in the country as the '60-40 measure', is focused on the transportation and tourism sectors, which were severely affected by the restrictions on travel introduced to limit the spread the coronavirus.
In April, the European Commission approved Bulgaria's 1.5 billion levs job retention scheme for preserving employment in sectors most severely affected by the containment measures imposed over the coronavirus outbreak.
According to the latest data published by the employment agency, Bulgaria’s registered unemployment rate fell slightly by 0.4 percentage points month-on-month to 7.5% in August. At the end of August, there were 245,774 registered unemployed people.