EU Commissioner for Regional Policy: European funds worth EUR 350m pending for Romania

The European Commissioner for Regional Policy, Corina Cretu, has stated on Thursday that the EU funds had started to come to Romania, as all the management and control institutions had been accredited and the Romanian authorities can send invoices to all European institutions.

“We have good news, European money started to come to Romania, all management and control institutions have been accredited, so the Romanian authorities can send the invoices now. Only in August, the Commission has paid EUR 95 million to Romania and we still have invoices worth EUR 350 M pending, to reach Romania as soon as possible. I will discuss with the PM and the ministers the details for every field, what are the problems and solutions,” said Cretu after meeting Chamber speaker Liviu Dragnea at the Parliament on Thursday.

She added that Romania has reached about 90% of EU funds absorption on the exercise 2007-2013.

“We reached somewhere 89-90-91% absorption rate, when there was 4% in 2012 (…) We’ve made huge efforts to reach this absorption rate, which actually means 51,000 new jobs, thousands of SMEs. Of course, there are only 300km of highway, but thousands of county roads have been repaired (…) We have to keep fighting so that Romania should have a budget to respond its needs to develop and curtail the development gaps,” Cretu also pointed out.