Early this week the Western Region of Romania hosted the “Cooperation in Regional Development” conference, organized jointly with the Republic of Moldova. The purpose of the event, held in Timisoara, was the exchange of best practices between the West Region, Romania and the North, Center and South Development regions of our country and building of technical skills for developing regional projects and identifying resources needed to implement projects with European funding.

The forum was attended by the following officials from the Republic of Moldova: Mr. Liviu Oboroc, Deputy Minister of Regional Development and Construction, Mrs. Efrosinia Greţu, Chair of the  Regional Development Council (RDC) of the South region, Mr. Vasile Bâtcă, Deputy Chairman of North RDC, as well as representatives of the Ministry of Regional Development and Construction and Development Agencies North, South and Center and the Academy of Public Administration under the President of the Republic of Moldova.

The officials stated that the goal of participation in the forum was to take over Romania’s experience with respect to projects funded by the European Commission and to identify the financial resources necessary for the implementation of regional development projects in our country. They also noted that representatives of the Western Region had presented issues related to the implementation of projects with European grants.

Sorin Frunzăverde, the Chair of the West Regional Development Council said the event had preceded the signing the Memorandum of Understanding between the West Region (Romania) and North Region (Republic of Moldova), and was a result of visits made ​​by Moldovan officials in 2011-2012. He attended the forum with members of the West Regional Development, representatives of local public administrations and business leaders from the region, representatives of the Regional Office for Cross Border Cooperation Timişoara and representatives of universities in the region.

Participation of delegation from country was organized in cooperation with the German Development Cooperation through GIZ.