Prime Minister Rumen Radev emphasized the importance of education during the cabinet meeting on 09.09.2026, describing the country's PISA test results as "catastrophic." He firmly urged the Ministry of Education and Science to accelerate reforms, insisting on prioritizing the expansion of engineering programs in higher education institutions and increasing the share of secondary technical and vocational education.
The main part of the discussion was dedicated to the adoption of a road safety reform plan. According to Prime Minister Radev, achieving this strategic goal requires not only institutional coordination and prevention but also access to reliable, comprehensive, real-time information. To put an end to the current fragmentation of data, a single national information management authority is to be established, along with a center for its processing and monitoring. All these activities will be integrated within the Executive Agency "Road Transport Operator," which will serve as a centralized control body.
The unified system will consolidate data from a wide range of road traffic sources:
- The toll system;
- Municipal cameras;
- Police body cameras;
- Various sensors, including data for the secondary road network.
The potential benefits of the system include increased safety and optimization of revenues for the National Revenue Agency, the toll system, and the Customs Agency. Access to the platform will be granted to Emergency Services, the 112 emergency line, forestry officials — for the purpose of monitoring cargo and illegal logging — as well as other departments responsible for traffic safety.
Parallel to digitalization, the government is also working on infrastructure development, as a modern road network is fundamental to safety. The Ministry of Transport and the Ministry of Regional Development and Public Works have already prepared an in-depth analysis of project readiness and have created a register of strategic projects subject to legal, financial, and market assessments. Due to the identified deficit in project readiness for new construction, a meeting with the construction industry and civil organizations is scheduled for next week. The goal of the dialogue is to refine the funding model and identify priority transport projects, encompassing airports, railway connections, ports, and roads.