More Than Half Of Romanians Have Seen A Doctor At Least Once Over Past Year
Around 70% of Romanians have seen a doctor at least once over the past year and most of them are in favor of building private hospitals with Emergency Receiving Units (ERUs), according to a study.
The study also shows that 67% of Romanians have visited the doctor either at hospital or at a clinic at least once over the past 12 months and 42% of respondents said they would rather go to private hospitals.
Youngsters aged 18 to 29 and people with higher education who live in big cities in Romania and in capital city Bucharest are more willing to go to private hospitals to see a doctor. (Curentul)
Transport Minister Says 12 Companies Interested In CFR Marfa
Romanian Transport Minister Relu Fenechiu said 12 major companies in Europe have showed interest in state-owned freight railway carrier CFR Marfa so far.
Fenechiu told Prime Minister Victor Ponta that the privatization process of CFR Marfa is on schedule.
The Transport Ministry has set an ask price of 798.05 million lei (EUR180.2 million) for CFR Marfa, one of the several state-run companies the government has pledged to privatize under a loan agreement with the International Monetary Fund.
The privatization procedure will have three stages: prequalification, negotiations based on non-binding preliminary bids and sealed-bid auction. (Curentul)
Prime Minister Ponta Wants Cogeneration Tax Removed From Electricity Bill
Romanian Prime Minister Victor Ponta recently said he talked to Minister-delegate for Energy Constantin Nita about eliminating the cogeneration tax which is currently included in all electricity bills in Romania.
Ponta said the tax, which targets to support producers of renewable energy, will be removed from electricity bills.
In turn, Romania’s energy watchdog ANRE head Niculae Havrilet said the tax will not be eliminated, but reevaluated in a move to reduce it in certain cases.
The cogeneration tax included in the price of electricity is charged in compliance with a European Directive, with a view to supporting investments in the renewable energy sector. Local producers of renewable energy benefit from government support via a green certificates scheme, which allows them to recover part of the production costs. Each renewable energy producer is granted a number of green certificates for power fed into the electricity grid.
The subsidies, which are eventually passed into consumers’ electricity bills, are not available for producers of conventional energy.
ANRE said recently that the government plans to reduce the number of green certificates granted to solar energy producers starting with 2014. (Curentul)
Ruling Coalition Takes First Step To Amend Constitution
Romania’s Social Liberal Union, or USL, plans to lower the participation quorum at referendums to 30% of eligible voters, from the current 50%, a few months ahead of its planned referendum to revise the country’s Constitution.
This is one of the provisions included in a draft act submitted to the Senate by several lawmakers of the ruling coalition. The draft act targets to amend the referendum law.
End-February, USL said is considering holding a national referendum in September to revise the Constitution. (Puterea)
Romania’s Annual Inflation Rate Highest In EU In March
Romania registered in March, for a third month in a row, the highest annual inflation rate in the European Union, of 4.4%, the EU’s statistics office Eurostat said Tuesday.
The annual inflation rate in the EU fell to 1.9% in March from 2.0% in February, while the annual inflation rate in the eurozone shrank to 1.7% from 1.8% in February.
The countries with the highest annual inflation rate in March are Romania (4.4%), Estonia (3.8%) and The Netherlands (3.2%), while the countries with the lowest inflation rate are Greece (- 0.2%), Latvia (-0.3%) and Sweden (-0.5%). (Curentul)