PRESS RELEASE
Speech of the Bank of Albania Governor, Mr. Ardian Fullani, addressed while presenting the 2004 Annual Report to the Albanian Parliament audience, on May 9, 2005

According to the Bank of Albania estimates, the development of the Albanian economy over 2004 was in line with the objectives of the strategy on the economic development of the country. Based on the latest estimates, it results that Albanian economy grew by 6.0 percent in real terms, keeping the average development rate of the last five years. The economic growth rate of Albania has been throughout this period higher than the one of other Southeastern European countries or even the one of the countries being recently members of the European Union.

The activity conducted by the Albanian economy, as a relatively open economy, was fuelled by the invigoration on a world-wide scale of the economic activity throughout 2004.