Slovenia to hand out calculators before converting to euro

Slovenia’s Central Bank has decided to hand out calculators to each household ahead of adopting the euro in January 2007.

The calculators – about 700,000 of them – are to be distributed in the autumn with the aim of enabling Slovenes to convert euro prices into Slovene tolars, making it easier for people to adapt to the new currency, Slovene media reported today.

The Central Bank governor, Mitja Gaspari, confirmed the reports.

The Slovene tolar, which currently stands at 0,004 of a euro, has been in use in Slovenia since 1991, when the country of 2 million, which joined the European Union and NATO in 2004, declared independence from the former Yugoslavia.

The European Commission is to announce later this year whether Slovenia satisfies conditions for adopting the euro and the government said yesterday the country most likely would get the green light.

If so, Slovenia would be among the first of the EU’s 10 new members to adopt the euro.