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Lending in Romania, in psychologic blockage, says Adrian Vasilescu

Lending is undergoing psychological blockage in Romania as banks are waiting for the new norms the Central bank (BNR) might adopt, Central Bank advisor Adrian Vasilescu said on Thursday.

BNR first vive governor Florin Georgescu, Wednesday,announced a possible strategy change in 2009 as regards the lending norm.

'BNR will reassess in January the lending norms,' Georgescu said.

The future decision of the Central Bank seems to be going towards getting in line with with the European Commission's decisions in November 26, one of its main elements being to resume lending, ensure companies' access to financing, especially in the SMEs field , considered vital for the relaunch of the Union's economy, with indirect effect on the emergent countries, analysts say.

The European Commission has today presented a comprehensive plan to drive Europe's recovery from the current economic crisis. The Recovery Plan is based on two mutually reinforcing main elements. Firstly, short-term measures to boost demand, save jobs and help restore confidence. Secondly, 'smart investment' to yield higher growth and sustainable prosperity in the longer-term. The Plan calls for a timely, targeted and temporary fiscal stimulus of around 200 billion euro or 1.5 percent of EU GDP, within both national budgets (around 170 billion euro, 1.2 percent of GDP) and EU and European Investment Bank budgets (around 30 billion euro, 0.3 percent of GDP).

Every Member State is called upon to take major measures good for its own citizens and good for the rest of Europe. The Recovery Plan will reinforce and accelerate reforms already underway under the Lisbon Growth and Jobs Strategy. It includes extensive action at national and EU level to help households and industry and concentrate support on the most vulnerable. It puts forward concrete steps to promote entrepreneurship, research and innovation, including in the car and construction industries. The Recovery Plan aims to boost efforts to tackle climate change while creating much-needed jobs at the same time, through for example strategic investment in energy efficient buildings and technologies.

The top priority is to protect Europe's citizens from the worst effects of the financial crisis. They are the first to be hit whether as workers, households, or as entrepreneurs.

The Commission is proposing to simplify criteria for European Social Fund Support, re-programme spending and step up advance payments from early 2009, so that Member States have earlier access to up to 1.8 billion euro in order to reinforce active labour market policies, refocus support on the most vulnerable, step up action to boost skills and where necessary opt for full Community financing of projects during this period.

Up to 4.5 million euro of cohesion funding will also be brought forward, alongside other measures to accelerate the implementation of major investment projects and this too will contribute to protecting and creating jobs.

The European Globalisation Adjustment Fund (EGAF) will be reviewed to allow it to act quicker and its scope expanded so it can keep people in jobs as well help people to find new ones. The EGAF budget will also be reviewed.To create demand for labour the Plan invites Member States to consider reducing employers' social charges on lower incomes and calls on the Council to adopt, before the 2009 Spring European Council, the proposed Directive to make permanent reduced VAT rates for labour-intensive services.

The Recovery Plan includes detailed proposals for partnerships between the public sector - using Community, EIB and national funding - and private sectors to boost clean technologies through support for innovation: these include a European green cars initiative with combined funding of at least 5 billion euro, a European energy-efficient buildings initiative worth 1 billion euro; and a 'factories of the future' initiative estimated at 1.2 billion euro.

The emphasis throughout the Recovery Plan is on 'smart investments'. Investing more in education and (re-)training helps people to retain their jobs and get back into the labour market, whilst raising productivity. Investing in infrastructure and energy-efficiency keeps people in the construction industry in work, saves energy and improves efficiency. Investing in clean cars helps protect the planet and will give Europe's companies a leading edge in a highly competitive market.

The Recovery plan will build on the Small Business Act to provide further help for all SMEs, including among other things removing the requirement on micro-enterprises to prepare annual accounts, easing access to public procurement and ensuring public authorities pay invoices within one month.

The Plan also includes further initiatives to apply state aids rules in a way that achieves maximum flexibility for tackling the crisis while maintaining a level playing field. These new steps include a simplification package to speed up decision-making, a temporary increase in of the 'safe harbour threshold' for risk capital to 2.5 million euro and, also temporarily, further scope for Member States to guarantee loans to businesses.

Adrian Vasilescu took part in a financial-banking seminar in Sinaia, organized by Alpha bank and the Central Bank under the EU-cofile European program.

 

Sursa: http://www.rompress.ro

Tags: european recovery lending euro adrian vasilescu billion car bnr bnr

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