Tonny Lybek, IMF: Draft law for health reform in Romania, done by end-June

Romania will work on draft law for health reform by the end of June this year, as agreed between local authorities and the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Romania allots insufficient funds for health, as a percentage of the GDP, compared to the average in the EU, according to Tonny Lybek, IMF representative for Romania and Bulgaria. The country is yet unable to raise its budget revenues above 32 percent of its GDP, Lybek added. He also mentioned the need for fiscal adjustments and for increase in the absorption of EU funding for Romania. The energy market liberalization and restructuring state companies were among the measures Lybek highlighed. “Romania is blessed with resources,” he said, but they are not efficiently use because of the low price, especially to industrial consumers, the IMF representative said. The lack of enough explorations has led to the need for gas imports, at high prices, from Russia, according to the IMF official. The health reform law was withdrawn from public debate at the beginning of the year. Members of the Democratic Alliance of Hungarians in Romania (UDMR) argued that enforcing the new law in 2012, an elections year, would lead to wrong interpretations of the new health system. On the energy segment, Romania recently sent a new electricity law to the Parliament for approval, setting the steps for the liberalization of energy prices in the country. editor@romania-insider.com