MODERN ASPECTS OF AGRICULTURAL STATISTICS IN BULGARIA

Abstract

The development of agricultural statistics in Bulgaria over the last two decades has been accompanied by a number of organizational and methodological problems. On the one hand, they are generated by the overall restructuring of the agricultural sector – changes in the form of ownership, land relations, production and industrial restructuring, and agricultural policy, which has led to serious difficulties in carrying out statistical surveys. On the other hand, the preparation of the country for the EU accession imposed institutional and legal harmonization both in the sphere of agriculture and in the sphere of statistics, incl. agricultural statistics. This necessitated the creation of a new specialized institutional structure, a statistics authority which is to carry out statistical surveys in agriculture in line with the European requirements. The present article focuses on statistical surveys carried out in agriculture with the aim to outline the organizational and methodological framework of modern agricultural statistics in Bulgaria. The emphasis is on their methodological aspects and major elements of their organization – scope, object, frequency, form of carrying out, sources of information.