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Unclear Procedures, Red Tape, Refund Delays Hinder Romania’s EU Funds Absorption

Unclear procedures, excessive red tape, petty pre-financing, huge delays in reimbursements and beneficiaries’ complaints, are the main factors leading to a low absorption rate of European Union Funds in Romania, Oana Preda, head of the Resource Center for Public Participation, said Tuesday.
Unclear Procedures, Red Tape, Refund Delays Hinder Romania’s EU Funds Absorption
29 iun. 2010, 17:08, English

Preda stressed that the Center’s role is to collect notifications from applicants with respect to the accession to EU funds, adding that applicants mainly complain about the circuit of money within projects, petty pre-financing or huge delays in reimbursements. Applicants’ complaints also target excessive red tape and delays which keep stalling procedures needed to absorb EU funds.

Under these circumstances, Cristina Zevedei, head of the Authority for the Management of Sectoral Operational Program Human Resources Development (AMPOSDRU), cautioned that several procedures, although deemed useless, cannot be scrapped as they are imposed by audit bodies or the Finance Ministry.

Ovidiu Nicolescu, head of the National Council of Private Small and Medium Enterprises in Romania (CNIPMMR), underscored that, in order to rejoice an efficient absorption of EU funds, AMPOSDRU should keep re-allocating funds depending on what the Romanian economy needs and should complete its organizational structure, considering that only 70% of positions are currently filled.

Nicolescu added that there are also problems in recovering the value added tax, due to delays of up to one year and a half and called on AMPOSDRU to step in and do something so that the „refunding of VAT for EU funds should be put on the front burner.”

Petru Dandea, vice-president of Cartel Alfa union federation, said a series of propositions regarding the access to EU funds were forwarded to the European Commission on June 16. These propositions target, among others, to grant global subsidies to small entities with technical expertise only, not financial capacity, or to include technical assistance in the early stage of project design.

AMPOSDRU said Monday that the European Commission decided, following an audit mission, to resume payments within the Sectoral Operational Program Development of Human Resources, which were suspended in December 2009 due to deficiencies.

The value of non-reimbursable financing reached nearly EUR1.2 billion on June 11. A total 791 contracts were signed and other 360 projects worth EUR700 million are to be contracted.