PM Ciolos: Getting rid of corruption, blockage sources when implementing projects on European funds is important
Prime Minister Dacian Ciolos said Monday that getting rid of corruption and blockage sources when implementing projects on European funds is important.
"Where projects contracted on European funds (...) cannot be completed, money from the national budget will have to be earmarked so that they may be carried through. That also happened in the past. (...) Unfortunately, (...) we are paying a price for the gaucheries of last years. It is hard to make up in some months for everything that did not happen in years. To me, it is important that we prepare this 2014-2020 period the best possible and in as transparent a manner as possible, to get rid, as much as possible, of all corruption, red tape and blockage sources related to project implementation, because on that the abortion capability as well as absorption quality will depend along with the quality of projects we fund," Ciolos told Radio Romania Actualitati public radio station in reply to what happens to the money when projects funded by European funds, such as the Piata Sudului passageway in Bucharest City, are not completed on schedule.
Ciolos also said Romania should improve its uptake of European funds.
"We certainly have to improve this process, particularly in terms of institutional preparedness, because there have been delays in Romania preparing the budget implementation for 2014-2020, including in recovering the uptake related to 2007-2013. Some months after the inauguration of the incumbent government, the uptake increased by 10 percent thanks to the measures we took and also because of support from the European Commission, which allowed us to use European funds to reimburse certain projects that had not been partially funded from the national budget. That is how we managed to recover on the finish line and bring the absorption rate past 70-75 percent," Ciolos explained.
He added that the objective of his cabinet is to release calls for proposals for all operational programmes.
"Our attention is currently focused on publishing as many guides for beneficiaries as possible and release the calls for proposals for as many operational programmes as possible. Our objective would be to launch calls for proposals for all the operational programmes by the end of our term in office and start, at the same time, payments for certain projects already contracted," said Ciolos.
Over 1.9 billion euro under the 2007-2013 budget framework came to Romania in the past eight months and guides for 12.2 billion euro were launched for the current programming period (2014-2020), informs the European Funds Ministry (MFE) on Monday.
"We estimate that Romania will receive from the European Commission reimbursements worth 539 million euro for the sectoral operational programme human resources development, for which the commission had blocked the payments to Romania, but which we managed to unblock in May," European Funds Minister Cristian Ghinea said Monday before meeting officials of the Chamber of Deputies' Committee on European Affairs.
According to the statement, MFE will send to the EC for approval the following major projects: the rehabilitation of the railway Simeria — Km 614 — worth about 1.5 billion euro; Metro line M6 1 Mai — Otopeni — about 350 million euro; ten water and waste water infrastructure projects worth about 1.5 billion euro (Alba, Hunedoara — Valea Jiului, Vrancea, RAJA — Constanta, Satu-Mare, Ilfov, Galati, Suceava, Turda-Campia Turzii, Cluj — Salaj) and one coast erosion project (second stage) — 22 million euro.
Moreover, Romania this May initiated the absorption for the current programming period (2014-2020). The first payments from the European Commission stand at 57 million euro.
Guides for 12.2 billion euro have been launched. When rural development is included, the value reaches 14.9 billion euro for the 2014-2020 period.
"In conclusion, at this moment we are receiving projects for 44.99 percent of the structural and investment funds," Ghinea said.