October the 23rd, 2024 – The Croatian economy is growing and that’s something we can all be glad about, but the level of poverty in this country isn’t shrinking. In one part of Croatia, every third person is on the edge of poverty.
As Poslovni Dnevnik/Josipa Ban writes, across what’s commonly referred to as Pannonian Croatia, a region that encompasses eight counties, from Karlovac to Vukovar-Srijem, almost every third person (31.3 percent) lives at risk of poverty and social exclusion.
More than 360,000 inhabitants of this region live on less than 5924 euros per year, which is the threshold of the risk of poverty. The economic and social condition of Pannonian Croatia, which includes central and eastern Croatia, is far, far worse than other parts of Croatia. For these people, the fact that the Croatian economy is growing means very little, and only intensifies their age old feeling of being entirely left behind.
Here in Zagreb, for example, 11.9 percent of citizens are at risk of poverty and social exclusion, 18.6 percent in Northern Croatia, and 18.9 percent in Adriatic Croatia, according to recently published Eurostat data.
Despite the the Croatian economy growing strongly, which Prime Minister Andrej Plenković likes to frequently brag about, the standard of many people remains poor and unchanged. In fact, a review of the ten-year national statistics on poverty risk rates in Croatia shows that the country has failed to make any any progress to provide the most vulnerable groups of people with the opportunity for a better quality of life.
In the period from 2014 to 2023, this rate has ranged from a high of 20% (2015 and 2017) to a low of 18% in 2022. However, last year the percentages at the state level jumped up again, to 19.3%. According to the National Plan for the fight against poverty and social exclusion, this rate should have been reduced to 16.8% last year.
The same plan, which should see around 3 billion euros invested in the area of combating poverty and exclusion by 2027, should also reduce inequality in society. That issue remains quite high in Croatia, according to the Gini coefficient (the leading index for measuring inequality), which is above the EU average (29.7). Slovakia, Slovenia, Belgium and the Czech Republic, however, have the most equitable distribution of income in Europe.
The most financially and socially vulnerable social group in Croatia are pensioners, that is, those over 65 years old. This is especially true for those who live alone and, as expected, are unemployed. This speaks volumes about the state of the pension system in Croatia.
European statistics, which deal with the problem of poverty at the regional level, reveal that in southern and eastern Europe, residents of rural areas are likely to be more exposed to the risk of poverty. In stark contrast, completely different patterns are observed in other countries.
For example, in Romania, an EU Member State where the percentage of people living at risk of poverty is the highest (32%), this risk is significantly lower in the capital Bucharest (12.3%). On the other hand, in Brussels and Vienna, the capitals of Belgium and Austria, the risk of poverty is far higher than the national average (37 and 29% in the cities against 18 and 17% of the national average).
