Romania posted aa‚¬A“very goodaa‚¬A results under the stand-by agreement with the IMF, says finance minister

Newsroom 31/01/2011 | 14:17

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the European Commission (EC) appreciated Romania’s “very good” results under the stand by agreement, said this Monday Finance Minister Gheorghe Ialomitianu quoted by Mediafax newswire. He added that revenues from collected VAT allowed the government to pay arrears and reach the 6.5 percent budget deficit target for 2010.

“These are very good results, appreciated by the IMF and the European Commission. The VAT results are good. VAT collected allowed us to pay arrears and stay within the 6.5 percent deficit target,” Ialomitianu said.

Collections of VAT, excise duties and non-fiscal income had the largest share in the 7.2 percent hike in budget revenues in 2010, helping offset the lower collections from the income tax, as well as from social security contributions.

In 2010, the budget stood at RON 33.3 billion, 6.5 percent of the gross domestic product, according to preliminary data from the Finance Ministry. The target agreed with the IMF was RON34.6 billion.

For this year, authorities forecast a budget deficit of 4.4 percent of GDP.