ALDE's Tariceanu: Amounts used for Danube-Bucharest Canal can be used for stringent works

The Alliance of Liberals and Democrats (ALDE) supports the majority of drafts adopted by the Government to be carried out in public-private partnership, apart from the one that concerns the completion of the works for the Danube-Bucharest Canal, as the necessary sums for this investment could be used for financing "more stringent works", declared on Tuesday, the chairman of the ALDE party, Calin Popescu Tariceanu. 

"I discussed (...) about the list of projects in public-private partnership and approved through Government ordinance, where we have a series of observations to make and a series of suggestions that we wish to discuss within the governing coalition with PSD [the Social Democratic Party, major at rule, e.n.]. We support the great majority of projects included in the approved list, but we have one point to make, which is not about political opportunity, but rather about economic-technical criteria. It is about the Bucharest-Danube Canal, which was initiated during the 80's, and even then it was not economically viable and raised serious technical issues," Tariceanu said after the ALDE leaders' meeting. 

In his opinion, resuming works is "extremely delicate", and the costs are high. 

"There are serious question marks concerning the usefulness of such works, which, from estimates, would go up to 1 billion Euro. We believe that this billion Euro could be used to finish works that are far more stringent, from the list of public-private works, such as the Siret-Baragan irrigation channel, that has multiple uses, both for irrigation and water supply. Normally, 80 percent of the surfaces that could be irrigated, and which go up to half a million hectares, could be supplied by the water falling, namely without consuming electrical energy, so it is very convenient for the agriculture, economically speaking," the ALDE leader explained. 

Tariceanu listed a series of projects that could be carried out instead of finishing the Danube-Bucharest Canal, among which to "finalize or to do capital repairs to a series of existing works, such as the A2 highway, entrances and exits on A2 are not made, entry and exit points in Bucharest, entry and exit through important customs, which tie Romania to the neighboring countries, major infrastructure in Moldova, Iasi-Targu Frumos motor way, a gymnasium, because something like this does not exist in Iasi," Calin Popescu Tariceanu added.