At the end of August 2025, Romania reached an absorption rate of 17.1% of cohesion policy funds, above the EU average of 12.3%, the country's Minister of European Investment and Projects Dragos Pislaru announced on Monday.
"European money is a huge opportunity for Romania. At the end of August, the country reached an absorption rate of 17.1% on cohesion policy, above the EU average of 12.3%. It's a good step, but it's not a reason for triumphalism. We need to accelerate the pace of absorption even more," Pislaru wrote in a social media post.
He said that about 20% of the National Recovery and Resilience Plan (PNRR) funds have been allocated to the private sector, exclusively for SMEs, and almost 5,000 contracts have already been signed.
"For the private sector, we have allocated about 20% of the PNRR - over EUR 1.15 billion exclusively for SMEs. Almost 5,000 contracts have already been signed, but we know that the delays in the digitalisation program have tested the patience of entrepreneurs. We promised and delivered: by the end of the year, all blocked projects will be unblocked through a joint effort MIPE - partner banks. Some programmes did not work as we would have liked, but the money was not lost. We have reallocated them to other priorities, and the lesson learned is clear: support must be offered through financial intermediaries, not just through classic calls."
According to Pislaru, the financial instruments have brought real results: more than 2,000 SMEs have accessed low-interest loans, and venture capital funds have attracted hundreds of millions of euros, with effects for the next decade.
"A central piece in this new model is the Investment and Development Bank, consolidated and capitalised with European funds. It becomes the engine of fast funding, with grants of up to 40%, cheap loans and modern solutions for Romanian companies. In the same logic, the Start-Up Nation programme will be redesigned on European money, with a focus on sustainability and competitiveness. And for transparency: we will publish an interactive map with all the projects funded under PNRR and the cohesion policy. Anyone - citizens, journalists, civil society - will be able to see where the money is going and what results it brings. I strongly believe in a paradigm shift: from the logic of "free" money to competitive, transparent and sustainable funding, which offers oxygen to SMEs and real chances to the Romanian economy," Pislaru also wrote.
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