Bulgarian employers will have to rewrite all labour contracts because of changes in the classification of economic activities, which went into force on January 1 2008, Raiko Buchvarov of the National Statistical Institute (NSI) said on February 4.

The new list includes four new economic sectors and other sectors had been reclassified, grouped in different ways from before or extended, Dnevnik daily said.

The classification is used to establish minimum salaries and minimum social security thresholds. NSI said that in 2008, the old classification, which dates from 2003, would still be valid. For negotiations between labour and trade unions over salaries for 2009 the new list would have to be used, NSI said.

This year would be a transition year in which the classification had to be adopted by all Bulgarian institutions. The computers systems at the National Social Security Institute (NSSI) and the National Revenue Agency (NRA) still had to be adapted.

The new and updated classification follows European regulations and changes that occurred in the economy over the past several years. It even included some professions which not yet existed, NSI experts claimed.
The changed would lead to better economic analyses, NSI said.

New professions on the list included management of fund, investment funds and reinsurance.
The new classification section on agriculture included for the first time separately professions like producer of spices, tobacco, sugar-cane and rice. The classification had been enriched with professions like citrus and tropical fruit producers, Dnevnik said.

The ideas was not to create a closed system for the economy, but to give it the possibility to grow, Dnevnik quoted Vucharov as saying.

On the website of the NSI current classification codes could be converted to those in the new system, NSI said.