Measures for the implementation of the NRRP

Romania will submit to the European Commission its first payment request under the National Recovery and Resilience Plan.

Daniela Budu, 27.05.2022, 13:50

The Bucharest Government passed on Thursday the last normative act needed in order to submit to the European Commission next week its first payment request, for 3 billion euros, under the National Recovery and Resilience Plan (NRRP). The normative act concerns the mechanism to be put in place when the NRRP funds are mismanaged. This was the third condition Romania had to comply with so that its payment request is accepted. The first condition refers to control and verification mechanisms and performance of objectives while the second condition refers to uploading on the Commission’s platform of the 21 objectives reached by end-2021.

As regards the normative act adopted by the Government on Thursday, the Minister of European Funds, Marcel Bolos, said that mismanagement will be sanctioned under the national legislation.

Marcel Boloş: Beneficiaries of the National Recovery and Resilience Plan should know that we will not have any financial corrections, as it was the case with the cohesion policy. In terms of irregularities, they will be approached from the perspective of national laws and fines or other types of sanctions will be applied.

Marcel Boloş also said that the NRRP is implemented with difficulty due to the many milestones and targets. Nevertheless, he believes that without thorough control and verification mechanism, the European Commission could block the money: The cohesion policy and the NRRP require that each program should have a management and control mechanism. Not complying with this, means risking the suspension of the operational programs. It is the Commission’s right to impose this, in case the management and control mechanisms do not live up to EU standards and requests.

According to the Romanian Government, by end-2022, Bucharest will benefit 10 billion euros under the NRRP, which will go into reforms and investment. By 2026 Romania is to receive more than 29 billion euros from the EU. The money, received either as grants or as loans, will be directed towards reforms and investments, to promote green transition and digital transition and to consolidate resilience and cohesion. (EE)