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BRDO PRI KRANJU, Slovenia-Europe's economy faces a rougher time in 2008 than last year in the face of financial market stress and surging oil and food prices, the European Union's Slovenian presidency warned Tuesday."We are certainly aware of the fact that in economic terms 2008 will be one of the more difficult years for the EU, certainly more difficult than 2007 was," Slovenian Prime Minister Janez Jansa(picture left) told journalists."It would be unrealistic of us not to expect certain problems, because of the issues that we have witnessed in the financial markets, because of the rising price of oil and food and the impact of these price increases on the economies of the EU member states," he said.Jansa was outlining Slovenia's priorities during its six months at the helm of the EU during the first meeting between the European Commission and the bloc's presidency, which it took over for six months last week.He said that Slovenia intended to raise "the problems on the financial markets" at a mid March summit as well as "the measures that need to be adopted as a follow up to the situation, in order to prevent such situations in the future."In November, the European Commission forecast economic growth in the 27-nation EU would slow this year to 2.4 percent from 2.9 percent in 2007.EU Economic and Monetary Affairs Commissioner Joaquin Almunia told AFP on the sidelines of the meeting that "the hypothesis now would be a bit more pessimistic, which means that downside risks to our forecast have increased.""I hope that 2008 will be a year of growth even if growth is not as positive as in 2007," he said.As in the days of Noah.....
