discussing and adopting these acts by the national assembly. this also applies to the most important laws – the law on the euro adoption, and the law on the bnb. the draft law on the euro adoption is about to be finished. the draft law on the bnb has been finalised, according to the set timeline. it will be approved by the bnb governing council at its next meeting that will take place on 13 april, i. e. in about a week from now. as the bnb is not entitled to direct legislative initiative, we are going to immediately submit this draft to the ministry of finance so that they move it on to the national assembly. therefore, 2 / 5 bis - central bankers'speeches when we speak of the legal framework, it is not so much about our readiness with drafted laws, but about whether we will have a working parliament and political will. if these are present, the legislative programme can be fully completed in the next few months. the fourth group of tasks deals with the technical preparations and the entire logistics of the process of accession to the euro area. with regard to this group of tasks, not a small part of the burden falls on the bulgarian national bank and commercial banks. we are working intensely and systematically to fulfil this group of tasks. i will give a few examples to illustrate this. as a central bank, we have already received the full documentation on the minting of the bulgarian euro coins. you probably know that at the end of last year, together with the minister of finance, we signed a memorandum on this issue with the european commission and with the eurogroup that represents the euro area member states. under this memorandum, we have received the full set of documents from the european commission and we are preparing for the first tests of minting the bulgarian euro coins. the programme for development and renovation of our system of cash centres is well under way. the new cash centre in plovdiv opened a bit more than a year ago, another cash centre is about to open in pleven, and we have already initiated the project for acquiring a site and starting the construction of a new cash centre in varna. the adaptation of the payment systems is also going as planned and in close cooperation with the european central bank. of course, i can give numerous technical and logistic examples but i will leave it at that. the same applies to commercial banks'preparations, which are running relatively smoothly. we are monitoring and guiding this process

##ised, including in the report on bulgaria that the oecd presented yesterday. it gives clear messages that key indicators for our banking sector, such as capital adequacy and liquidity, are above the average level not only for the european union, but also for the oecd countries. institutional convergence is therefore not an exercise in itself. it brings significant positive results. fiscal consolidation means restoring our more than 20 - year track record of drawing up and exercising a disciplined budget, which was somewhat lost in the last two years. fiscal consolidation is important both in the short term and in the medium and long term. in the short term, it is important because it is the main macroeconomic tool at our country's disposal to contain and reduce inflation, which, as stated, is the only criterion for joining the euro area that we do not meet. even outside the context of the euro area, fiscal consolidation is important, with a view to avoiding the macroeconomic imbalances we witnessed only a few years ago. one channel for the creation of such imbalances is the increasingly open conflict between the fiscal expansion of the past two years and the ongoing global trend of monetary policy tightening. the two policies must work in sync. the medium and long - term aspect of the fiscal consolidation topic is related to the structural reforms to be carried out in the country. a disciplined regular budget with a realistic medium - term macroeconomic and fiscal forecast will provide the framework needed to accelerate structural reforms in relation to investment, the labour market, perhaps the most serious medium - term risk to our economy, education, social security, social assistance, health care, not forgetting of course energy security. to conclude, let me summarise what i want to say. bulgaria is not in a bad position, yet, in terms of joining the euro area. a large and important part of the road has already been covered through the accession of our country to the european banking union and of the bulgarian lev to the european exchange rate mechanism. in order to complete this process successfully, several groups of tasks need to be completed. first, it is necessary to meet the nominal convergence criteria, with a focus on inflation, which is actually the only criterion we are currently not meeting. second, it is necessary to fulfil pre - accession commitments in the 4 / 5 bis - central bankers'speeches areas of the non - banking financial sector, anti - money laundering measures, the management of state - owned enterprises, and the ins