On May 20, 2003 in Rila Hotel in Sofia the Bulgarian Center for Not-for-Profit Law in cooperation with the Institute for Integration Studies and with the kind support of the Open Society Foundation and the United State Agency for International Development (USAID) organized a seminar - discussion on the opportunities for NGOs to deliver health services.

On May 19, 2003 in “Radisson SAS” Hotel in Sofia, the Bulgarian Center for Not-for-Profit Law Foundation (BCNL), the Open Society Foundation and the Parliamentary Center for European Law Foundation (PACEL) organized a seminar on “Endowments and the practice in the CEE countries and USA”.

A new Law on the Measures against Funding of Terrorism has been adopted by Parliament and promulgated on 18.02.2003.

The recent amendments of the Bulgarian Social Assistance Act were published in the Official Gazette on 29 of December 2002. They entered into force on 1 of January 2003. The essence of the amendments can be formulated as follows:

An expert group on issues related to NGO taxation is established at the Ministry of Finance upon the initiative of the Bulgarian Center for Not-for-Profit Law (BCNL).

At the end of 2002, amendments to the Corporate Income Taxation Law and the Law for Taxation on the Income of Physical Persons were adopted, which provide tax benefits to NGOs and their donors.

The electronic version of the Catalogue of Non-Governmental Organizations in Bulgaria is created by the Resource Center Foundation.

A summary of the research called “NGOs activity economic effect in Bulgaria for the period of 1991-2001” has been published in the section COMMENTS AND ANALYSES/ ANALYSES on BCNL’s website.

The Ministry of Justice of the Republic of Bulgaria passed Regulation No 1 from 15.08.2002 on the terms and manner of issuing permits for performing non-profit activities by foreigners in the Republic of Bulgaria. (Published: State Gazette No 81, August 23, 2002 - in force from August 30, 2002.)

On 23.07.2002 at the office of the Central Registry of Non-profit Legal Entities designated for public benefit a new software product “Information system intended for the Central Registry for Non-profit Legal Entities, designated for performing public benefit activities” was officially presented.