The Serbian Finance Ministry expects the 2012 GDP growth to total 3 per cent, thus increasing from this year's RSD 3.359 billion to RSD 3.614 billion (approximately EUR 35.9 billion) in the next year, states the report on 2012 fiscal strategy with projections for 2013 and 2014, which was released on Thursday.

According to the Finance Ministry's preliminary projections, the GDP growth per capita should increase from EUR 4.518,3 in 2011 to EUR 4.799,1 in the year to come.

The Ministry also expects the inflation rate to drop from 7.9 per cent in 2011 to 3.5 per cent in 2012.

According to projections, the euro value of exports should drop from 17.4 per cent in 2011 to 13.5 per cent in the next year, the import would also drop from 13.2 per cent to 8.8 per cent, current account deficit should increase from 7.6 per cent in 2011 to 8.7 per cent of GDP in 2012 while the external trade deficit would drop by 0.2 per cent relative to 2011, thus totalling 15.1 per cent of GDP.

The Finance Ministry started preparing the report on 2012 fiscal strategy with projections for 2013 and 2014, which marks the formal beginning of the 2012 budget planning. The report should be adopted in the third week of October.