Romanian Businesspeople Eye Lease Of Projects Of National Interest

“We’re asking the Government and the Finance Ministry to establish the list of objectives of national or regional interest which cannot be backed by public funding at the same time with the multiannual budget, and to propose to the business environment the takeover of these works by lease, in a transparent, predictable manner,” the Association of the Businesspeople in Romania (AOAR) said in a statement.

The measure would help the completion of a larger number of works especially in the infrastructure field, as well as in the social sectors, thus leading to business development, investments attraction, creating new jobs and increasing revenues to the state budget by investments,” the association said.

“The Government must regard the business environment as a priority, as it is the only one that can generate the budget revenues needed to have state institutions working properly and to meet social promises made in the electoral campaign and included in the governing agenda,” the statement said.

Business people are asking authorities to help the business environment, according to the decision adopted at European Union level, as well as the policy adopted by the governments of some member states.

“We are asking publicly for a joint stance of the Government and BNR (Romania’s central bank) explaining the lack of interest of the Romanian authorities in having talks with international funders, the European Union, the European Central Bank, the European Investment Bank or the International Monetary Fund, in order to ensure a sole funding source of a program reviving economy and reindustrializing Romania, in accordance with the commitments made in the governing agenda,” the statement read.

The association said the economic crunch taht has spread to all sectors which contribute most to the gross domestic product will lead to a severe and irreversible squeeze of the economic growth in 2009, in the absence of adequate measures.