The Romanian Agency for Foreign Investments (ARIS) is working on ten investment projects aimed at the automotive industry, the wood industry, trade, services and heavy industry, which are worth more than $350 million together, Marian Saniuta, ARIS' chairman on Monday said.
He specified those were new projects adding up to the other 250 registered from October 2001, when Law 332 on promoting direct investments likely to make a significant impact on the economy (i.e. those worth more than $1 million) came out through the end of last year. "The commitments of the 250 projects are in excess of two billion dollars, with nearly 55% of this accounting for foreign contribution," ARIS chairman said. A number of 110 investment projects worth nearly $800 million have been completed thus far, while several other projects have seen official dedications announced for the first half of 2004.
"Austria's Holzindustrie Schweighofer will dedicate a lumber mill in Sebes early in April, an investment totalling $64 million. In about 45 days, MediSystem will dedicate a private hospital in Bucharest, a $12 million investment. At the same time, the brick factory in Gura Ocnitei, Dambovita County will be dedicated in May at the latest. This is an investment of the Austrian Wienerberger Company and is worth 20 million euros," Saniuta said.
The automotive wiring factory (a $10 million investment) of Japanese Yazaki Group located close to Ploiesti will begin production by June, as will the textile material processing factory of the US-based Johnson Controls near Ploiesti again (a $16.5 million investment). "The Buftea-based apparel accessory factory of Japanese YKK Company, a $10 million investment will be completed in Q3, this year," Saniuta added.
Furthermore, German Tengelmann Group is planning to open 30 neighbourhood stores in Romania this year. This is but the first stage of a more extensive investment programme of the German group, which set out to open 100 stores, an investment estimated to 200 million euros.
According to the data supplied by the National Bank of Romania (NBR), the foreign direct investment in 2003 amounted to $1.5bn (1.3bn euros), 37.6% higher than in 2002. "The contract for selling the 25% plus two shares in Banca Comerciala Romana (Romanian Commercial Bank - BCR) was signed with EBRD and IFC (World Bank's investment arm) in 2003. If adding the $222 million - the value of the transaction that is, Romania attracted $1.8bn foreign investments. Still, since these funds will be actually transferred this year, they will be considered as foreign investment attracted in 2004," Saniuta said, explaining why the $1.8bn foreign investment target of the ruling programme was missed. miruna.lebedencu@zf.ro
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