"Few people realise just how much work goes on behind the scenes when a country joins the EU. But we have had a lot of practice over the last 20 years, and it is good to see that preparations for Croatia are going reasonably smoothly. I look forward to welcoming Croatia into the European family," Commission Vice-President Maros Sefcovic was quoted as saying.

After releasing its final report on Croatia's preparedness on Tuesday, the Commission "today adopted its first report setting out the state-of-play of administrative preparations for the accession of Croatia to the EU. The report concludes that preparations are on the right track, and that all measures will be in place before Croatia accedes on 1 July 2013."

The commission reports that "some delays have been identified in just five areas, and the effects of these delays are expected to be manageable. They include for example a delay to the translation and publication by Croatia of the 'acquis' or body of Community law into the new language (although at the current rate, the work will be finalised in time for accession). The launch of a competition for middle management was also slightly delayed, to April."

"The Commission also today adopted more specific targets for Croatian recruitment by Directorate-General (DG). Already in July 2012, the Commission set itself a target of recruiting 249 Croatian nationals as officials and temporary agents: 149 administrators, including 13 middle and 4 senior managers, and 100 assistants. The target should be reached by the end of a five-year transition period (1 July 2013 - 30 June 2018). Today's decision to set targets for DGs ensures that Croatian recruits are fairly represented across all policy areas."

"With the accession of Croatia, the population of the EU will increase by around 4,443,000, the number of official languages will increase to 24, and the surface area of the Union will increase by 56,594 square kilometres," it concludes.