The plans are more than spectacular, considering that since December 1989 the Romanian state has barely managed to finalize some 150 new km of highway. New investments suffer from chronic lack of funds, and the European Union’s charts indicate that Romania has a zero absorption rate for EU road infrastructure funds.

Transporters said that the strategy for new road network investments was completely wrong. “Romania lags far behind countries such as Hungary, Serbia, and Croatia, mainly due to politics. Since 1997, there have been builders and financers, who wanted to build highways, but were not allowed to do so. If public private partnerships had existed then, by now we would probably have over 1,500 km of highway,” said Radu Dinescu, Secretary General of the National Union of Transporters in Romania.

The National Company of Highways and National Roads (CNADNR) said that projects will continue as scheduled only if the state grants the requested funds. Thus, for 2010, CNADNR applied for RON 6.7 billion (some €1.5 bln) from the state budget, and plans to attract a similar amount from foreign loans and European funds. “If next year we receive what we requested from the budget, namely 3 percent of gross domestic product, we will meet our deadlines. If we get less money, we will extend these deadlines,” the company’s General Manager, Dorina Tiron, told ­Business Standard.

Romania has obtained only €11,400 of the €1.3 bln allocated by the European Union for road infrastructure in the 2007-2009 period, in spite of approval for a total of 17 projects within the Operational Programme “Transport.”

Tiron added that CNADNR managed to obtain €20 mln from European funds in 2009 for road construction. She admits Romania spent little EU money this year, but indicates that procedures have just now been unblocked, so we can expect larger amounts in 2010. “ISPA [Ed. n -Instrument for Structural Policies for Pre-Accession] projects have been blocked to mid-2009, due to problems related to land and utilities. As concerns the cohesion fund, which makes funds worth €1.3 bln available to Romania, the management authorities were established this year, so it is just from now on that projects can be set into motion,” Tiron said.