14th of June 2011: Perspectives of Romania’s and Bulgaria’s Schengen accession: Between the Implementation of the criteria and the changes made in the European context
At the conference organized by OSI Sofia attended CRPE, support interior ministers of the two countries, ambassadors of European countries that opposed along the two countries during accession to Schengen in March 2010, representatives of Europol and Frontex.
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13th of June 2011: First expert meeting in the project “EU and justice reform. Lessons learned from Romania and Bulgaria; Moldova and Ukraine; Croatia, Macedonia and Serbia’s experience.”
“EU and justice reform. Lessons learned from Romania and Bulgaria; Moldova and Ukraine; Croatia, Macedonia and Serbia’s experience” is a project implemented by the Romanian Center for European Policies (CRPE) and financed by the German Marshall Fund, Open Society Institute East East program and Konrad Adenauer Stiftung. The objective of this project is to create a framework for discussions and to propose innovative solutions to improve the EU conditionalities, in order to speed up the judiciary reform in Croatia, Macedonia, Serbia, Ukraine and Moldova.
To this end, 7 country reports will be launched in September 2011, which will represent the judiciary particularities in each state involved in the project (Romania, Bulgaria, Serbia, Croatia, Macedonia, Moldova and Ukraine), and in November 2011- a comprehensive report with conclusions and recommendations for the EU.
On June 13th 2011, at the InfoEuropa headquarters in Bucharest the first meeting of the experts involved in the project took place: Laura Stefan and Cristian Ghinea, experts from Romania, Antoinette Primatarova, expert Bulgaria; Munir Podumljak, expert Croatia; Mihail Gotovski, expert Macedonia; Alexandru Cocîrță, expert Republic of Moldova, Dragana Boljevic, expert Serbia, Volodymyr Yavorskyy, expert Ukraine. The list of participants is available, here. The objective of this meeting was to define the working methodology and the structure of the reports.
The EU’s mission (im)possible? Bringing the judiciary on the right track - A theoretical perspective – Anitta Hipper.
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25th of May 2011: Roundtable at the European Commission Representation. Adopting the Euro in 2015: benefits and vulnerabilities
The public debate about the target-term of 2015 for the euro adoption creates an interest among Romanians and divided public opinion into two camps, some claiming that Romania will not be ready until then, others saying that a firm assuming of the target would be a much welcomed stimulus to continue the structural reforms.
The European Commission Representation in Romania held today, 25th of May, at the European Union House in Bucharest, a round table attended by representatives from both trends of opinion.
During the talks, the following persons took the floor: Niculae Idu – Head of the European Commission Representation in Romania, Leonard Orban, presidential advisor, Adrian Vasilescu, adviser to the Governor of BRN, Ionut Dumitru, president of the Tax Council, Laurian Lungu, Managing Partner Macroanalitica, Mihai Ionescu, president of the National Association of Exporters and Importers in Romania, Cristian Paun, Executive Director of the Romanian Society of Economics, Ilie Serbanescu, Vice President of the Romanian Society of Economics, Florian Libocor, BNR SCG chief economist.
The debate was moderated by Cristian Ghinea, director of the Romanian Center for European Policies.
In preparation for the roundtable, CRPE developed a synthesis study (only in Romanian) of the main ideas and their chronology in the national public debate on this issue in recent years: “Adopting the Euro in 2015: how we got to this date and what chances do we have?”. The full text of the synthesis can be read here.
The event was presented LIVE TEXT on EurActiv.ro in the project “CRPE-EurActiv Debates”.
The full article and the readers’ comments here.
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4th of may 2011: The Small farms and the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) or how to consolidate the agricultural holdings by giving new opportunities to small and medium farms
On November 18, 2010, the European Commission published the Communication “The Common Agricultural Policy in the perspective of 2020 “, the result of an extensive public debate during 2010 that began at the invitation of Romanian Commissioner Dacian Ciolos. Among the issues on which the Commission ruled in that communication is the one of small farms, for which the Commission wishes to propose a simple scheme, specific only to small farms, which would replace the current regime for the granting of direct payments.
Given that in Romania this type of agricultural areas represent a high percentage of agricultural holdings, the Romanian Centre for European Policies (CRPE) has organized on May 4, 2011, with the support of EurActiv and Infoeuropa, a public debate on this issue with key stakeholders, publicly proposing a simplified model of the scheme by which small farmers can have access to without filling in the annual subsidy applications and complex forms. At the basis of discussion were the proposals made in the CRPE Policy Brief no. 7 by the expert Lucian Luca, the discussions focusing on (1) diagnosing the Romanian agricultural problems in the context of the CAP reform and (2) finding solutions (both for procedures and criteria) to increase the use of land.
The summary of the debates can be viewed here (only in Romanian).
The event was presented LIVE TEXT on EurActiv.ro within the project “CRPE-EurActiv Debates”. The complete article and the readers’ comments here.
Photo from right to left: Daniela Giurca, General Director Policy Sector in the MADR Vegetable Sector; Nina Talvar, Personal Adviser, Cabinet of State Secretary Adrian Radulescu, MADR;Willy Schuster, EcoRuralis; Tiberiu Cazacioc The Association Radu Anton Roman Initiative Group;
The full list of participants here.
This debate is the first events of its kind from the series “CRPE forums on Romanian agriculture in the CAP context” to be organized by CRPE in the near future.
The CRPE debate appears in the project “Romania active in the European debates II” developed by the Romanian Center for European Policies (CRPE) and funded by the Soros Foundation in the framework of the External Politics Initiative.
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12th of April 2011: We have a draft – what’s next?
Considerations regarding the law project on European affairs coordination between the Parliament and the Government.
In 2010 CRPE, together with the Friedrich Ebert Romania Foundation (FES) evaluated the capacity of the Romanian Parliament to participate in debates regarding European policies. Following the interest and the recommendations received from the members of the Romanian Parliament and the Department for European Affairs, CRPE and FES organized on April 12, 2011 the first CRPE Forum on European affairs, which enjoyed the presence of the most important actors involved in the process of coordinating European affairs. The summary of the debates can be read here.
Today, after almost two months from this reunion, DAE and MAE made a legislative proposal for coordinating the European affairs which is now under public debate. The legislative proposal can be read here.
In this context, CRPE launches today the policy brief no.9 “We have a law project – what next? Considerations regarding the law project on cooperation between the Parliament and the Government in the European affairs domain “. The report here(only in Romanian).
To prepare this report, CRPE organized on June 9, 2011 the second CRPE Forum on coordinating European affairs, where it invited the technical staff from the Romanian Parliament.The objective of the meeting was to punctually analyze the provisions in the law project proposed by MAE and DAE and updating the policy brief draft by CRPE with the experts’ comments.
The innovative character of the report resides in the fact that it brings together apparently divergent ideas in a set of recommendations what can offer concrete solutions to facilitate the dialogue between the Executive and the Legislative in the effort of finding a compromise in the process of negotiation.
The Project, although ambiguous in certain aspects, is a document that allows reaching a consensus between the two institutions, to the extent that the two parts follow this. In perfecting the legislative project, CRPE makes the following proposals:
- Including in the project the explicit possibility for the Parliament to influence establishing Romania’s position in the Council;
- Giving up article 9 which makes reference to protection of classified information;
- Giving up the express mention of the Parliament’s veto lack in this domain by amending article 3 and art.18;
- Presenting clear terms for transmitting the document both for the Parliament and the Government and avoiding vague formulations (eg. “in shortest time”);
- Establishing the Department for Coordinating European Affairs as coordinator in the European affairs domains and thus, as main speaker of the Parliament in this domain;
- Establishing a deadline for submitting this law project to Parliament approval, and the prospect changes can be done later, after the coordinating mechanism will grind.
The project, in its actual form, is one step closer, and both the Parliament and the Government have to promote and approve the project resulted from the consultation of both sides.
This report is part of the project ”Strenghtening the Romanian Parliament’s capacity to be an active European actor”, undergone by the Romanian Center for European Policies together with the Friedrich Ebert Romania Foundation.
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March 2011: The opportunity window stays opened: What’s next in the strategic partnership for European Integration
CRPE organized at Chisinau the conference “The opportunity window stays opened:
What’s next in the strategic partnership for European integration” in which it was presented the study” Romania seen from Chisinau “, performed by Dragos Dinu, Public Sector Coordinator in the CRPE.
In the conference, hosted by IDIS Foundation – Future, which was attended by senior officials and diplomats in Romania and Moldova, with representatives of civil society in the two countries were discussed relationship priorities Romania – Republic of Moldova in 2011. Summary debate available only in Romanian, here.
From left to right: Lazurca Marius Sorin Hadarca, Ghinea Cristian, Dragos Dinu.
Presentations in the debate:
How we used the opportunity window– Cristian Ghinea
Neighbourhood Added Value – Sorin Hardarca
The project “Monitoring Integration Partnership Romania – Moldova” is financed by the Soros Foundation Romania.