Romania: Press review - January 27

Bucharest, Jan 27 /Agerpres/ - Romania's national dailies of Wednesday give main coverage to President Traian Basescu paying his first visit to Moldova since the installation of a democratic regime in Moldova; Prime Minister Emil Boc declaring war on tax evasion; the IMF perception over Romania's 'significant progress,'; a real estate index will be introduced for the relevant Romanian market; the local labour market facing an excess of university graduates.


President Traian Basescu is paying today a visit to Moldova, ahead of a strong ministerial delegation, to confirm the resumption of normalcy in the relations between Romania and Moldova, six months after a power switch in Chisinau.

Evenimentul zilei quotes Director of the Institute for Public Policies of Romania as saying after 20 years of complicated bilateral relations, the Romantic era of flower bridges should make room for pragmatism, and Deputy Chairman of the Democratic Party of Moldova (PDM) Oazu Nantoi as saying he is waiting for Romanian investors to come and invest in what has been left of Moldova's economy.


Curierul national and Curentul quote Prime Minister Emil Boc as having stated on Tuesday that he will declare war on tax evasion in 2010 and make sure that the National Tax Administration Agency (ANAF), the Romanian Police and the Public Prosecution will identify and eliminate tax evasion sources. 'We will start a war against tax dodging in 2010. Before thinking whether or not to increase rates and taxes- and I want to tell you very clearly that we do not intend to increase any main tax this year - we have to collect what we already have,' said Boc.


Romania's representative with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) Mihai Tanasescu tells daily Gandul in an exclusive interview that Romania will be receiving the promised funds from the IMF, that there will be no new prerequisites and that the most important thing is that significant progress has been acknowledged.

Ziarul financiar notes that the Romanian Government has convinced the International Monetary Fund and the European Commission to ease up the 2011 Government deficit target, initially set at 3 percent of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP), according to sources close to the negotiations.

The two international financiers would have agreed to extend extra time to the Romanian Finance Ministry, given that cutting the deficit from an estimated 5.9 percent of the GDP in 2010 to 3 percent in 2011 is too ambitious a target to be achieved in just one year. The condition for this extension would be the Romanian Government proving this year that it can bring discipline into the budget implementation and guarantee a falling trend for the deficit.


Jurnalul National reports that President Traian Basescu on Tuesday awarded Romania's Star in rank of Collar to Governor of the National Bank of Romania (BNR) Mugur Isarescu, who becomes the third Romanian to receive the highest decoration of the Romanian State, after academician George Emil Palade and late Patriarch Teoctist.


Ziarul financiar also remarks that the National Bank of Romania took the risk of denting its credibility in 2009 by overshooting the inflation target, for the third consecutive year - 2009 inflation stood at 4.74 percent, higher than the 4.5-percent highest acceptable value, because the cost of containing price increases would have entailed a wider economic contraction, according to the explanations on Tuesday of BNR Governor Isarescu.


The papers report that the National Statistics Institute (INS) is promising to finalise a real estate index by the end of the second quarter of the year and come up with a new method to compute inflation in 2012. INS Chairman Vergil Voineagu is quoted as saying the price to be reflected by the real estate index will be the price established after negotiations between property sellers and buyers, as authenticated by the notaries.


The extremely low temperatures of the past days have forced local administrations to increase daily gas imports from Russia to meet local demand.

State secretary with the Economy Ministry Tudor Serban is quoted as saying the decision was taken in order to prevent problems with natural gas supply to the local markets and the population. The additional gas supply for Tuesday and Wednesday will be 2 million cubic meters a day. According to Serban, the situation has got stable.


Financiarul reports that the production capacity of Ruukki Romania, the local subsidiary of the Finnish Group Rautaruukki, has increased following the relocation of some production lines from the Czech Republic and Hungary to the company's facility at Bolintin Deal, Giurgiu County. Officials of the company are quoted as saying that the weight of the exports of this Finnish manufacturer of metal structures will increase in 2010 from 30 to 50 percent.


Cotidianul remarks that Orange Code advisories for the northern Botosani County, the central counties of Brasov, Covasna and Harghita, the eastern county of Iasi and the northern counties of Neamt and Suceava, plus Code Yellow for 28 counties, Bucharest City included, will stay in force. Frost is expected to loose its vigour, the paper remarks.

Romania libera notes that the locals of Intorsura Buzaului, nicknamed the Northern Pole of Romania, have been fighting bitter cold the same way their ancestors did, namely by drinking the traditional tzuica plum brandy and getting warm on wood fire. Most of the locals are no longer scared by the low temperatures that have savaged Romania over the past days, because they are accustomed to them.


Weekly Capital notes that Romanian faculties have over the past years produced an excess of graduates. The effect: the labour market could not absorb them all and many of the graduates ended up hired for jobs that are underneath their educational background.

Many new graduates, fresh master's students, are working in restaurants and call centres. For some of them, this is a sign of easy life and big salaries won without much effort. For others, this is the sign of their failure to work in the fields where they trained to work.

The paper carries the findings of a UNESCO survey indicating that Romania has 44 university graduates per 1,000 inhabitants, significantly higher than Slovakia, the Czech Republic, Hungary and Germany.


Financiarul remarks that the Romanian book market could reach 65 million euros this year, according to publishers. AGERPRES

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