Romania supports a realistic European budget
“We are supporting a sustainable and realistic European budget” – the Romanian Finance Minister, Alexandru Nazare, says
Leyla Cheamil, 13.10.2025, 14:00
Funding the European Union budget must be based on the principles of equity, effectiveness, transparency and simplicity. This is the message the Romanian Finance Minister, Alexandru Nazare, conveyed at the meeting of the Economic and Financial Affairs Council, ECOFIN, held in Luxembourg on Friday.
According to a Finance Ministry communiqué, the meeting’s central topic was updating the EU’s own resources, which represents roughly 90% of the community budget incomes. The European Commission proposed five new own resources, namely the EU Emissions Trading System, the Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM), the E-waste own resource, which is a contribution to the EU budget with reference to the weight of electrical and electronic equipment in each member state that is not collected annually, the Corporate Resource for Europe, and also the Tobacco excise duty own resource.
“We are supporting a sustainable and realistic European budget able to support the EU priorities and bring tangible benefits to citizens. It is essential the green transition not generate disproportionate costs for the states currently undergoing a process of economic recovery,” Minister Nazare went on to say. In the meantime, Romania voiced concerns regarding some Commission proposals such as the introduction of resources based on electronic waste or cutting collection costs for traditional resources, such as custom duties.
Regarding the idea of simplifying the European legislative process, the Romanian side underlined the need for reducing the administrative and bureaucratic burden mainly in the case of small enterprises and public administration.
Minister Alexandru Nazare underlined the impact assessment must better reflect the specific of the member states with emerging economies and include differentiate evaluations to ensure decision-making based on evidence and adjusted to national realities.
“Romania is promoting equilibrium and European solidarity. Romania has supported the European initiatives of directing economies towards productive investment and reiterated the support for financial assistance and sanctions imposed to Russia,” the communiqué also says. On the other hand, Alexandru Nazare says that Romania has a duty to firmly promote its interests with arguments and a realistic understanding of the European context but to also meet its assumed pledges.
On the ECOFIN sidelines, the Romanian official held talks with the EU Commissioner for Economy, Valdis Dombrovskis, on measures of curbing the budget deficit Romania has endorsed and also on the next steps to be taken in order to draw up a realistic national budget for the year 2026. Another major topic was the renegotiation of the National Plan for Recovery and Resilience, PNRR, with a view to endorsing a new plan for the upcoming Finance Ministers meeting due in November
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