Country data: Latvia

All comparisons are with the figures for 10 December 2020, the previous reporting date.

The last 2 years, the COVID-19 pandemic forced Member State authorities to address pressing priorities and affected their performance in transposing EU rules to some degree. In this context, the Commission has taken a number of extraordinary measures aimed at relieving the strain on Member States’ administrative resources. Nevertheless, it has also made clear that the Member States’ legal obligations to transpose EU directives in time remain unchanged.

 

Transposition deficit (percentage of all directives not transposed): 2% (last report: 0.8%) – a huge increase of 1.2 percentage points. Latvia is one of six Member States that more than doubled their deficit in the reporting period and consequently missed the 1% target set by the European Council.        
EU average = 1.6%; proposed target (in the Single Market Act) = 0.5%

Latvia has consistently performed well on this criterion, except in 2016, when the Member States had to transpose an unusually large number of directives. However, it is now at double the 1% threshold, having recorded a 150% increase on its deficit from the previous year. In addition, Latvia did not transpose 12 of the 26 single market directives (46%) due to have been transposed in the 6 months before the cut-off date for calculating the deficit (1 June to 30 November 2021). This shows that Latvia may now have some difficulties organising the timely transposition of directives. Constraints due to the COVID-19 pandemic did not help. However, transposition is an ongoing process and any let-up may result in the deficit quickly increasing.

Overdue directives: 20 (last report: 8) including 4 on financial services and 4 in connectivity/media/ digital society. One directive is more than 2 years overdue (Directive 2013/59/EUR on basic safety standards for protection against the dangers arising from exposure to ionising radiation).

Average delay in transposing directives: 7.5 months (last report: 8.8 months) – a decrease of 1.3 months. Latvia is one of nine Member States that reduced their delay in transposing directives in the reporting period.   
EU average = 8.6 months

Latvia has one long-overdue directive (due for almost 3 years). Most of its other outstanding directives (14 out of 19) have been due for less than 6 months.

Conformity deficit (percentage of all directives transposed incorrectly): 1% (last report: 1%) – a stable result, and Latvia’s highest deficit (but still below the EU average). 
EU average = 1.3%; proposed target (in the Single Market Act) = 0.5%

The number of new infringement proceedings that the Commission has launched against Member States for incorrectly transposing single market directives has more than halved in 2 years. Nevertheless, the number of ongoing cases is still high. With 10 directives presumed to have been incorrectly transposed, Latvia is among the 9 Member States with the lowest conformity deficit (1% or less).

Evolution of transposition deficit

 

Evolution of conformity deficit

 

All comparisons are with the figures for 1 December 2020, the previous reporting date.

 

Pending single market cases: 17 (1 new case and 6 cases closed, including 4 on sustainable and intelligent transport; last report: 22 pending cases) – a marked decrease of 5 cases. Latvia is well below the EU average number of cases.            
EU average = 27 cases

After 3 consecutive years of increases, Latvia reversed the trend with a 23% reduction in its cases. It is in the top five Member States with the lowest number of infringement cases.

The Commission launched 120 new cases against Member States in the reporting period (besides those for late transposition), and these were still pending on 1 December 2021. One case (the lowest number among Member States) was launched against Latvia, which is well below the EU average of 4 new cases launched in the reporting period. However, 6 Latvian cases have been resolved since December 2020, which is less than the EU average (8).

Problematic sectors: the environment (5 cases); services and professions (3) and energy (3). Together, these make up 65% of all pending cases.

Average case duration: 36.3 months for the 17 single market cases not yet sent to the European Court of Justice (last report: 21.8 months) – a huge increase of 14.5 months (the highest increase among Member States). This is the longest average case duration ever for Latvia but still well below the EU average.           
EU average = 42.8 months

The average case duration of Latvian cases significantly increased in the last 3 years (+39%). Latvia is no longer among the Member States whose duration of cases is below the indicative target of 36 months. It has only 2 cases running for more than 5 years, although 1 case on EU citizenship is almost 9 years old.

Time taken to comply with Court rulings: Latvia has no more single market cases at the Court-ruling stage of the procedure (last report: 8.5 months).       
EU average = 46.8 months

Performance – Latvia performed very well.

• Results for four indicators were above the EEA average.
• Performance improved for three indicators, most notably for requests accepted within 1 week and those replied to within the deadline.
• The counterparts’ satisfaction indicators decreased slightly.

• Caseload – small
  Submitted cases: 22 (18 in 2020)
  Received cases: 2 (3 in 2020)

• Cases not accepted:14 (18 in 2020)

• Resolution rate: 100% (100% in 2020)
• Handling time (as home centre)
  Reply in 7 days: 100% (94% in 2020) – very good
  Cases prepared in 30 days: 100% (100% in 2020) – very good
  Solutions accepted within 7 days: 100% (100% in 2020 ) – very good

• Cases not accepted within 100 days: 78% (78% in 2020) -very good

• Handling time (as lead centre)
  Cases accepted within 7 days:  100% (100% in 2020) – very good
  Cases closed in 10 weeks:  100% (50% in 2020) – very good
• Staffing level
  Sufficient

In 2022, the average payment delay (the time exceeding the legal or agreed payment terms) by Latvian public authorities was 14 days.

The average number of days needed for a business to have its invoices paid by other businesses (business-to-business payments) was 55.45 days.

Indicator	2021	EU average
Burden of government regulation (survey replies: 1 = worst, 7 = best)	4.1	3.6
Digital public services to start and run a business (100% = best performing)	85.8%	n/a
Payment delays by public authorities	14 days	15.7 days
Time to resolve insolvency	1.5 years	2.0 years
Impact of regulation on long-term investment decisions (survey replies)	10.7%	n/a

Indicator	2021	EU average
Single bidder	26%	25%
No calls for bids	11%	6%
Publication rate (value advertised on Tenders Electronic Daily, in % of GDP)	8.6%	5.9%
Cooperative procurement (proportion of procedures with more than one buyer)	15%	5%
Award criteria (proportion of procedures awarded to cheapest bid)	77%	64%
Decision speed (days)	77	99
SME contractors	90%	61%
SME bids	91%	73%
Procedures divided into lots	38%	31%
Missing calls for bids	0%	1%
Missing seller registration numbers	1%	29%
Missing buyer registration numbers	0%	11%

Note: A typical (mid-ranking) EU country is used for the EU average for all indicators except the publication rate. Due to delays in data availability, publication rate results are based on 2020 data.

Indicator	2021	EU average
Restrictiveness indicator – architect	2.5	2.5
Restrictiveness indicator – accountant	0.0	1.7
Restrictiveness indicator – civil engineer	2.9	2.4
Restrictiveness indicator – lawyer	3.5	3.4
Restrictiveness indicator – real estate agent	0.0	1.3
Restrictiveness indicator – patent agent	2.9	2.2
Restrictiveness indicator – tourist guide	0.0	1.2
Domestic priority letter prices, letter 20 g (2020)	€ 1.00	€ 0.88
Intra-EU priority letter prices, letter 20 g (2020)	n/a	€ 1.53
Domestic transit times, day+1 performance, priority letters 20 g (2020)	85.4%	84.2%

Note: The EU restrictiveness indicator (EURI) measures the level of restrictiveness for the cross-border provision of services and the right of establishment for seven groups of professional services with a high share in the EU firms’ intermediate consumption or cross-border mobility. The level of restrictiveness is measured on a scale from 0 (least restrictive) to 6 (most restrictive). 

Indicator	2021	EU average
Access to public financial support (% of SMEs indicating deterioration)	10.4%	11.3%
Time to get paid by businesses (2022 survey)	55.5 days	52.5 days
Venture capital investments (% of GDP)	0.07%	0.48%