Question

Write a report about your country (Romania). Touch on topics such as poverty, equal opportunities and attitudes towards animals. About 250 words. It must have the structure of a report.

Answer 1

Răspuns:

Traveling around Romania, one sees two countries: one urban, dynamic, and integrated with the EU; the other rural, poor and somewhat stuck in the past.

Bucharest is a bustling metropolis with thriving modern services and a higher income per capita than the average for the European Union. A few secondary cities like Cluj, Iaşi, and Timişoara are fast becoming hubs of prosperity and innovation—Cluj is even becoming known as Romania’s Silicon Valley. Yet going to the smaller towns and the countryside, one gets the feeling that these places are still decades behind the capital and the rest of Europe.

Has Romania really benefited from Europe? What can the country do to spread prosperity beyond a few big cities? These were among the questions we tried to answer through the World Bank’s Systematic Country Diagnostic for Romania, which assesses the obstacles to and opportunities for inclusive and sustainable growth.

Romania and the European Convergence Machine

Few countries have benefited from integration into the European Union as much as Romania. Reforms spurred by accession brought in foreign investment, boosted productivity and raised living standards. Today, over 70 percent of the country’s exports go to the EU, and they are becoming more technologically complex. GDP growth in 2017 was 6.9 percent, making Romania one of the best performing economies in Europe. GDP per capita rose from 30 percent of the EU average in 1995 to 60 percent in 2017.

At the same time, Romania’s population shrank from 22.8 to 19.6 million since 2000, and is expected to keep falling. Between 3 and 5 million Romanians—most of them of prime working age—live and work in other parts of the European Union. Meanwhile, labor force participation is just 66 percent (a lowly 56 percent for Romanian women), way too low to offset aging and emigration.