European Funds for Romania
The European Commission has approved Romania's fourth payment request under the National Recovery and Resilience Plan, amounting to over 2.6 billion euros
Daniela Budu, 15.05.2026, 14:00
The European Commission has approved a new payment request under Romania’s National Recovery and Resilience Plan, amounting to 2.6 billion euros in non-repayable European funds. The Commission notes that Romania has made progress in several areas, including tax reform, pollution reduction, and reforms in the justice system, healthcare, and education. In the area of taxation, the Commission believes that Romanian authorities have amended legislation to create a fairer and more efficient tax system, with less bureaucracy and clearer tax rules for businesses and taxpayers.
According to the Minister of Investment Dragoş Pîslaru, payment request number 4, which includes complex reforms regarding sustainable forest management, decarbonization, digitization, and the revision of the tax framework, was approved without financial corrections. Dragoş Pîslaru explains what happens after this request is approved:
“Following the Commission’s decision, this assessment was forwarded to the Economic and Financial Committee; we are looking at May 27 for this formal procedure and then June 5 for the Council’s final decision. After that, the funds will be disbursed to Romania.”
Amending the salary law is one of the commitments made by Romania and one of the key reforms in the National Recovery and Resilience Plan upon which access to European funds depends, announced acting Prime Minister Ilie Bolojan. He also noted that in recent years there have been arbitrary increases or various court decisions that have brought about significant changes to the wage system. According to Ilie Bolojan, transparency and clear rules are needed, because at this time wage expenditures are disproportionately high relative to budgetary capacity. Ilie Bolojan:
“The constraints we face relate to maintaining the payroll budget as a percentage of Romania’s GDP at just over 8%. Today, it stands at 8.1% of the GDP, so we will not be able to increase this share in the coming years—not because anyone is unwilling to do so, but because we simply cannot afford it.”
It is also worth noting that, with the approval of payment request No. 4, the implementation rate of the National Recovery and Resilience Plan has exceeded 60%, and Bucharest still needs to secure approximately 10 billion euros through payment requests 5 and 6 to complete the Plan. Romania’s National Recovery and Resilience Plan is funded with over 21 billion euros, of which approximately 13.5 billion euros are in the form of grants and the remainder in the form of loans. Given that the mechanism will close at the end of this year, Member States must complete all remaining milestones and objectives by August 2026 and submit their final payment requests by the end of September 2026, the European Commission states. (MI)
