At the handover ceremony of the Univer Plc's food industry investment in Kecskemét worth HUF 3.5 billion (EUR 11 million), Prime Minister Viktor Orbán pointed out that "we can talk about growth in the case of the Hungarian economy, which indicates that the economy is on the right track".
Over the past six months, the Hungarian economy grew by nearly 4 percent, which alone is an excellent result, especially in a time of crisis, but the trend itself is even more important, the Prime Minister emphasised.
This is an encouraging sign which reinforces that the work we have carried out over the past few years was well worthwhile, he underlined.
The Prime Minster said that slowing down inflation and helping individuals with foreign currency denominated loans was a key step, as is the way in which Hungarian small and medium enterprises can count on receiving higher funding.
The Prime Minister highlighted that in the coming six and half, seven years Hungary will be carrying out investments worth a total of HUF 12 thousand billion (EUR 38 billion) with the help of own resources and EU funding accessible through the Government and added that 60 percent of this funding will be spent of economic development, which is good news for small and medium-sized enterprises.
The Prime Minister mentioned that the re-regulation of SME legal categories will open an opportunity, for example, for Univer, which does not qualify as a large enterprise from a European perspective, to also carry out major investments.
According to Viktor Orbán, Univer should be viewed as a model, since the company not only took back the formerly foreign-owned canning factory in Kecskemét, but is also capable of operating it better that the previous owners did. If the city and the companies based here join forces, the Government will be more than willing to contribute significantly to such an alliance, he added.
Balázs Szarka, CEO and president of Univer Product Plc said that the group that produces and distributes food products owns assets worth a net 11 billion HUF, employs 1,500 people and provides a living for over 500 small-scale producers.
Over the past 5 years, the 100% Hungarian-owned holding company in Kecskemét has invested HUF 7.2 billion in development.
Károly Molitórisz, CEO of Univer Product Plc said that the capacity of the tomato processing plant which used to be 25,000 tonnes has now increased threefold thanks to the present development, concurrently to which the technological, structural and energy reconstruction of the tomato processing plant was also completed.