Croatia has made great strides in strengthening its regulatory policy framework. In 2017, a new RIA law entered into force, requiring an initial RIA to be carried out for all primary laws. The law does not include subordinate regulations. A full RIA has to be conducted for laws with a potentially high impact, requiring regulators to assess a broad range of environmental and social impacts. If deemed necessary, a test analysing the impacts on SMEs is undertaken which focuses mostly on administrative costs. In practice, however, RIAs are not of sufficient quality due to a lack of analytical capacity in ministries. Croatia could consider creating analytical centres with “RIA champions” in the most important ministries in order to strengthen capacities.
Croatia systematically engages with stakeholders. It makes use of ad hoc working groups including representatives from civil society, businesses and academia early in the process. Major draft regulations are then published for consultation on the interactive consultation portal e-Savjetovanja for a minimum of 30 days. RIA statements are also made available alongside major draft primary laws for comments. The body drafting the regulation has to publicly address all comments received during the consultation period.
Ex post reviews of regulation are limited to administrative burden reduction and ad hoc recommendations from working groups. In 2017, the Ministry of Economy introduced the “Action Plan for Administrative Burden Reduction” with the purpose of creating investment incentives and providing easier market access. Croatia should envisage targeted ex post reviews focusing on the performance of regulations (“fitness checks”) or on particular sectors to improve the quality of regulations.
