Source: The Wall Street Journal and The Heritage Foundation Index

Lithuania’s economic freedom score is 71.5, making its economy the 23rd freest in the 2012 Index. Its overall score is 0.2 point higher than last year, with significant improvements in labor freedom, fiscal freedom, and monetary freedom offset to a large extent by a serious decline in the score for government spending. Lithuania is ranked 11th out of 43 countries in the Europe region, and its overall score is well above the world and regional averages.

Today, 18 April, an informal meeting of the EU Economy Ministers is hosted in Vilnius aimed to step up the pace of reforms required to promote growth at the EU level. Common priorities, to be communicated to the Commission and later presented to the EU Economy Ministers at the Competitiveness Council in May, will be agreed at the informal meeting.

Lithuania’s leading biopharmaceutical company, Sicor Biotech/TEVA, will build a new pharmaceutical plant in Vilnius. Due for completion by the end of 2013, the project has attracted almost EUR 22.6 million in foreign investment. Once on stream, the multifunctional plant will double the production capacity of Sico Biotech/TEVA, with over 95 per cent of its biopharmaceuticals produced for export.

Lithuanian games and visual apps developer Tag of Joy has won the AppCircus Best App Award at the Mobile Premier Awards 2012 held in Barcelona last week. The awards, which are in their sixth year, are sponsored by Intel, Mozzila, BlackBerry and other leading technology organisations.

Lithuania’s economic freedom score is 71.5, 0.2 point higher than last year, in the 2012 Index of Economic Freedom released by the “Heritage Foundation” think tank and "The Wall Street Journal".

The image editing app released by the Lithuanian software developer Pixelmator was named the App Of The Year by Apple last week.

IKEA, which runs an international network of furniture and household stores, announced today its plans to open a store in Vilnius which will be the first IKEA outlet in the Baltic States. The store, to be built in the vicinity of the Vilnius International Airport, is to be erected by Felit, an Icelandic company operating through a franchise agreement with IKEA.

Having moved up three positions from last year, Lithuania stands 44th in the newest global competitiveness list which is compiled annually by the World Economic Forum and includes 142 countries.

The government in Lithuania has managed to prove the political will and to implement severe fiscal consolidation over the last three years. This has been hard on people but helped to maintain financial stability and integrity of the country and ensured quick rebound of the economy after the crisis, said Mykolas Majauskas, chief economic advisor to the Prime Minister of the Republic of Lithuania in the interview broadcasted on Bloomberg Television.

Lithuania has set up a representation in the Silicon Valley, located in Northern California, in the United States, to raise the country’s awareness among the companies operating in the world’s best known agglomeration of technology businesses and to encourage their investment in Lithuania.

Vilnius, together with other nine cities from different parts of the world, was selected by The New York Times one of the world’s cities that are “both great and good”.

Biocentras, a Vilnius-based producer of biotechnology products, entered the shortlist of final five in the European competition aimed at selecting most innovative biotechnology companies. Apart from the Lithuanian firm, the EuropaBio’s top five included German, Belgian and two Dutch pharmaceutical companies.

The shuttle train “Saule” departed from the Chinese city of Chongqing 10 days ago, on October 28, and today is arriving to Lithuania. The 41-container train carrying office equipment will reach Lithuania through Almaty in Kazakhstan and passing via Russia and Belarus, onwards transporting goods to Scandinavian and other European countries via Klaipeda State Seaport.

For the first time a group of most advanced, highly awarded and recognized by German economy companies and science institutions from Lithuania will be exhibiting at Biotechnica on 11-13th of October 2011 in Deutshe Messe Hannover, Germany.

Statistics Lithuania informs that, based on provisional data obtained from customs declarations and Intrastat reporting data, exports in July 2011 amounted to LTL 5.7 billion, imports – LTL 6.3 billion. Foreign trade deficit of Lithuania amounted to LTL 0.6 billion, which is by 35.8 per cent less than in the same period in 2010. Data on trade with EU countries were adjusted after VAT returns data had been received.

For the first time a group of companies from Lithuania will be exhibiting at CTIA Enterprise & Applications 2011, on 11-13th of October 2011 in San Diego, USA.

Statistics Lithuania informs that, based on provisional data obtained from customs declarations and Intrastat reporting data, exports in May 2011 amounted to LTL 6.1 billion, imports – LTL 6.8 billion. Foreign trade deficit of Lithuania amounted to LTL 0.7 billion, which is 2.4 times more than in the same period in 2010. Data on trade with EU countries were adjusted after VAT returns data had been received.

Statistics Department of the Bank of Lithuania released today data on quarterly financial accounts of Lithuania in the first quarter 2011.

The main purpose of meeting between the Minister of Economy of Lithuania and Minister of Tourism of Israel was opening of direct flights between Vilnius and Tel Aviv. Israel‘s Minister of Tourism Stas Misezhnikov considered Lithuania as potential tourism service centre and the main link for Israel’s connecting flights even to the US.

Statistics Lithuania informs that, based on the data of the inbound tourism survey, the number of overnight trips of foreigners in 2010, compared to 2009, increased by 12.4 per cent (from 1.3 million in 2009 to 1.5 million in 2010), that of same-day trips – decreased by 3.5 per cent (from 2.7 million in 2009 to 2.6 million in 2010).