September 17 (BTA) - Bulgaria's 2019 Civil Society Organization Sustainability Index overall score is 3.5, down from 3.4 a year earlier, the Bulgarian Centre for Not-for-Profit Law (BCNL) said Thursday. This score places Bulgaria tenth out of the 24 countries under observation, compared to 9th place in 2018.

This is a drop in Bulgaria's overall score for a second year in a row. The decrease is registered in the scores for five out of the seven areas under observation: legal environment, organizational capacity, financial viability, advocacy, and public image. Bulgaria's scores for the remaining two areas - service provision and sectoral infrastructure - remain unchanged from 2018.

According to the Index, among the main factors resulting in the worsening of Bulgaria's civil society organization sustainability in the last two years, is the negative public campaign against the NGO sector in this country.

Bulgaria is one out of four countries whose overall score decreased from 2018 together with Belarus, Poland, and Serbia.

The country with the highest overall score is Estonia, while Belarus and Azerbaijan are at the bottom of the ranking.

The Civil Society Organization Sustainability Index has been following the development of the civil society organization sector in 24 countries in Central and Eastern Europe and Eurasia for 23 years now. For Bulgaria, the Index is developed by the US Agency for International Development in partnership with the BCNL.

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