During the International Defence Equipment Exhibition Hemus 2016 in Plovdiv government officials announced that in 2015 exports of the Bulgarian defense industry rose by 50% compared to 2014, as sales totalled more than 649 million euros. Some said this was a giant leap; others praised the boom of arms export and the fact that small Bulgaria is now tenth in the world when it comes to arms export. In fact, decades ago the volume of arms exports was much bigger, but the fact that until recently experts were talking about a collapse of sales in the sector, results are actually very good.

The government reported about the rise of exports just months after the foreign ministry voiced concerns about “controversial” destinations of exports. Criticism was rejected by the Economic Committee at the Parliament while the Ministry of Economy ironically commented that exports go to markets where Bulgarian arms are well-known and there was no way for Bulgaria to export arms to Norway or Honolulu.

Now the Foreign Ministry has no concerns but Amnesty International voiced criticism hours before new data were announced. The organization said that Bulgaria is one of the 12 EU countries that have been selling arms to Egypt since 2013. According to Amnesty International, in 2014 Bulgaria sold military goods to Egypt worth 51 million euros, including arms and ammunition for over 11 million. Last year, Egypt was mentioned in the critical remarks of the foreign ministry, but it should be pointed out that data for 2015 do not show Egypt as a destination of Bulgarian arms export. Most Bulgarian weapons go to Iraq, Saudi Arabia, India and the US.

Reasons for the growing exports of arms are the increased demand on traditional markets for the local defence industry, the high quality of Bulgarian military products and opening of offices of some major arms companies abroad that allow direct participation in tender procedures.

The positive developments in the sector have a beneficial effect on the entire economy, but mostly on national defence. A major part of revenues goes for the development of the armed forces, and they are now entering a phase of rearmament, which will not be short. Government plans include steady growth of the military budget until it reached 2 percent of the GDP in 2024. In the period 2016 -2018 defence spending in this country must be not less than 1.35% of GDP and by 2020 - not less than 1.5%. However, the strong results shown by the military industry may prove insufficient in the near future because of this ambitious program.

English; Alexander Markov