The Finance Ministry starts on Tuesday the talks with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) delegation on the 2016 state budget, Finance Minister Eugen Teodorovici has said.
“Today (on Tuesday) the IMF mission starts talks. We’ll discuss well known issues, mainly the 2016 state budget, the structural reforms, the royalties’ law, etc.,” Teodorovici said on Tuesday.
He added a new agreement might be also discussed. “Under the current international conditions, such an agreement, much more flexible, could represent a plus for Romania,” Fin Min said.
Romania’s agreement with the IMF, blocked in June last year, expired on September 26.
In early September, Finance Minister Eugen Teodorovici said that Romania intends to start talks with international lenders about a new agreement as of this year, so that it enters into force in 2016. In his view, the agreement is necessary for Romania to protect its finances against market shocks.
On the other hand, the IMF resident representative in Romania and Bulgaria, Guillermo Tolosa, said recently that, for a new agreement, Romania must request this from the international financial institution and then the IMF will analyze the type of agreement that can be concluded.
The recently terminated stand-by agreement was the 10th signed by Romania with the IMF in the past 23 years and the third agreement sought from the IMF since the economic crisis in 2009. The arrangement was concluded in September 2013 for 24 months and was to expire on September 26, 2015.