About 1300 km of Bulgarian roads would be rehabilitated with the money from the Regional Development operational programme, Dnevnik daily reported.

The lack of Bulgarian design companies to produce quality technical projects and the launch of the Regional Development operational programme coinciding with local elections in Bulgaria were among the main obstructions for Bulgarian municipalities to absorbed the programme's funds, Iskra Mihailova, deputy Regional Development and Public Works Minister said as quoted by Bulgarian news agency BTA.

Mihailova said consultancy companies from the EU member states showed great interest in helping Bulgaria carry out the operational programmes.

The deputy minister commented that municipalities with new mayors elected might drop behind on the programme because of the time the new teams would need to revise the projects of the old management. This could lead to up to two years of delay on the programme.

Mihailova announced that expectations were 1300 km of second and third class roads to be rehabilitated before the end of 2015. Passenger and load traffic on the rehabilitated roads should rise by 27 per cent as compared to 2006.