site.btaPresident Iotova Opens Bulgaria Across Five Oceans Career Forum

President Iliana Iotova opened the second Bulgaria Across Five Oceans career forum at Inter Expo Center on Saturday. The event is organized by the Bulgaria Wants You platform.

“There are so many people here, so many young people and, of course, so much enthusiasm and expectation,” Iotova told participants.

“Six years ago, Ivan Hristov, Andrey Arnaudov and I started out together. We met and discussed creating a platform for Bulgarians abroad. While we were thinking about what we had done for them, it turned out we had done nothing. There was not even a single platform where every Bulgarian abroad could find the information they needed,” Iotova said.

She said that was how the idea for Bulgaria Wants You was born.

“This is Bulgaria’s most successful cause of the past six years. It is successful because it is tied to the future. This cause is constantly developing. At first, the task was simply to present Bulgaria so that people would come back. Now Bulgarian institutions are involved, along with people who can inspire others,” Iotova said.

“I know how sensitive this issue is. We must realize that it is very delicate to turn to a person or a family and tell them there is another path for development.”

“Ivan [Hristov] and Andrey [Arnaudov] stepped into this delicate area and made it possible not to rely only on patriotic sentiment, but to convince people that returning to their homeland really is the best choice.”

“Ivan and Andrey convinced many people to return, settle here and set up their companies here,” Iotova said.

“Bulgaria is now on an incredible upswing. Look at the good things happening to us, Dara, the volleyball team. And there was so much grumbling over whether we would manage with the Giro d’Italia,” Iotova said.

Bulgaria can and must keep moving forward, she said.

The Bulgaria Wants You initiative and this cause must continue to develop and receive growing institutional support, Iotova added.

She said the platform’s success was proved by the 40,000 people registered on the Bulgaria Wants You website, showing they wanted to return, and by the 20,000 who had already done so.

“We hope you have a very good and meaningful day,” Hristov said in his welcoming remarks.

“This is, in practice, Bulgaria’s Eurovision for business and careers. The only difference is that everyone here wins,” Arnaudov told participants.

Hristov said the Bulgaria Wants You platform seemed to have relaunched over the past year.

Arnaudov said 40,000 Bulgarians had registered on the platform’s website in just eight months.

“What we are trying to do is keep building on what we do,” Hristov said. “By building up one another, we build up society as a whole,” he added.

“We have existed for six years, and during that time we toured major cities in Europe and met people, telling them why they should come home to Bulgaria,” Hristov said.

The two hosts said they would launch a new campaign in the autumn to show people why they should return to Bulgaria.

The event again brings together Bulgarians from the country and abroad, leading companies, visionaries and opinion leaders to present real opportunities for building a career and a life in Bulgaria, the platform told BTA earlier.

BTA is hosting its own booth at the career forum for the second year running. This year, BTA will spotlight BTA School, its internship and career development unit.

The media partners of Bulgaria Across Five Oceans are Nova Broadcasting Group, Darik Radio and BTA.