Commissioner Cretu: Romania has lost 1.8 - 2 billion euro in transport infrastructure, a sensitive area

Romania has lost between 1.8 and 2 billion euro from a total allocated funds of 19.5 billion euro in its most sensitive area, the transport infrastructure, European Commissioner for Regional Policy Corina Cretu said Monday. 

She participated in the "EuroImpact - Impact and results of cohesion policy in Romania; experiences with accessing funds and implementing funded projects" conference, organised by the European Institute of Romania (IER) in Bucharest. 

"From 2007 to 2011, the absorption rate was 4pct. I took office in 2014 with an absorption rate of 48pct. We close the financial cycle (...) with an absorption rate of nearly 90pct (...) Unfortunately, of 19.5 billion euro allocated to the funds I manage - the Cohesion Policy and the Regional Development Fund - between 1.8 and 2 billion euros have been lost for Romania's most sensitive area, the transport infrastructure," Cretu explained. 

She pointed out that there were "things that have affected Romania's potential" of taking full advantage of the benefits of the Cohesion Policy. 

"But, of course, if we look at the full part of the glass, of the 19.5 billion euro for the period 2007-2014, 17.5 billion euro were spent, but only about 14-15 billion were actual ground works, because almost 3 billion were saved under retrospective projects by taking over EIB and EBRD credits that Romania still had for completed projects such as the Sun Motorway that had already been built but for which the government would still pay loans. Likewise, we have also taken over the wages of all officials working with European funds in Romania, precisely in order to reach this 90pct absorption rate and to relieve the national budget of this borrowing burden," said Corina Cretu. 

She underlined that in the current financial cycle Romania has a total allocation of about 31 billion euro, including money for agriculture. 

"European funds provide funding for about 60-65pct of public investment in Romania. I say every time there were problems with project implementation. I was talking about cumbersome procedures and reduced administrative capacity. Today,we are talking about things that did not happen yesterday or in the last year. This is a weakness of Romania that goes back to the beginning of its joining the European Union when the country was not ready to access such a sum of money," Cretu said.