“Bulgaria is progressing at a good pace in negotiating and absorbing EU funding. Compared to the other EU members, this country is, at worst, halfway down the list of countries in terms of programmes processed from the current programming period,” said Deputy Prime Minister Tomislav Donchev. “Bulgaria has already declared 160 procedures worth 6 billion euro, or over 73 percent of the programme’s entire budget,” Tomislav Donchev stated. “A comparative analysis with the prior period shows that there now is a 2-3 fold predominance in all indexes. That is a normal thing, as we have now gained experience,” Donchev said.