EC: Romania has made limited progress in addressing the 2019 country-specific recommendations

Romania has made limited progress with the 2019 country-specific recommendations, taking into account that the substantial progress made in the financial and banking sectors have been counteracted by the lack of progress regarding the fiscal framework, the public pension system, the minimum inclusion income, predictability in the decision-making process and the governance of state-owned companies, shows the Country Report published on Wednesday by the European Commission.

According to the document, Romania has made substantial progress regarding in safeguarding financial stability and solidarity of the banking sector, and some progress in ensuring the long-term viability of the second pension pillar, as well as in respect to the implementation of the national public procurement strategy.

Moreover, the Community Executive argues that Romania has made limited progress in its efforts to strengthen tax compliance and collection, improving the quality and inclusiveness of education, social dialogue, developing a minimum wage setting mechanism based on objective criteria, improving access and cost-efficiency of healthcare, focusing investments on key policy areas and strengthening public investments projects.

Romania registered no progress in what concerns the implementation of the national fiscal framework, in ensuring the stability of the public pension system, completing the reform of the minimum income for inclusion, improving predictability of the decision-making process and improving governance of state-owned companies, the EC report mentions.

According to the Country Report, since the start of the European semester in 2011, 47 percent of all the country-specific recommendations for Romania have recorded at least "some progress," whereas 53 percent recorded "limited" or "no progress."

"Overall, Romania has advanced in implementing its country-specific recommendations since 2013. Even though efforts have been made, in several policy areas, action is slow and the country must endeavour to achieve tangible results on implementing reforms," according to the EC Report.

The European Commission published on Wednesday the 27 country reports of the analysis called "2020 European Semester: Assessment of progress on structural reforms, prevention and correction of macroeconomic imbalances, and results of in-depth reviews under Regulation (EU) No.1176/2011." AGERPRES