Just a day after the announcement of the 2011 budget, a study by a Brussels-based research institute today singled out Malta and Germany as the only two EU member states which in the past five years have boosted their competitiveness and fiscal stability.

Every other member state of the Eurozone has slipped into worse economic health, according to a scoreboard of debt, labour, productivity and trade indicators published today by Allianz SE.

Malta, the report says, achieved important milestones in reducing its structural deficit during the past two years and it is expected to be within the Maastricht criteria by the end of next year.

Almost all EU member states are facing legal procedures by the EU as they have exceeded the 3 per cent of GDP deficit ratio.

During 2009, at the peak of recession only Malta and Estonia managed to reduce their deficits.

“Virtually all eur-zone countries still face a massive task in getting their public finances back in order,” Michael Heise, Allianz chief economist and principal author of the study, said.

“There is furthermore a pressing need for improvement in the fields of structural competitiveness and productivity.” Greece, the trigger of the debt shock that rattled the euro, ranks as the economy most at risk. Portugal, Spain and Ireland are trailing closely behind.