Banca Naţională a României

At the Conference for Romania's Accession to the EU held on 28 June 2002 in Brussels, at chief negotiators' level, Chapter 11: Economic and Monetary Union was opened and closed on the same day. This document, which presents Romania's position to this negotiation chapter, covers the following areas: co-ordination of economic reforms, fiscal policy, monetary and exchange rate policies. The National Bank of Romania is of the opinion that the timely manner in which this chapter was opened and provisionally closed not only shows the consistency of commitments assumed by Romania, but also proves the European Community's confidence in Romania's achievements so far and in the timetable of negotiations in this area.

Romania committed itself to adopting the acquis communautaire by the envisaged date of accession. Although the final date of accession is 1 January 2007, the deadline for harmonisation of provisions concerning central bank independence, removal of direct financing of the temporary deficits of the Treasury by the National Bank of Romania, and the privileged access of public institutions to the resources of financial institutions, which for the time being do not fully comply with European legislation, is set for 2004. This state-of-affairs shows the utmost importance attached to this Chapter. Moreover, it was agreed that the euro would be the reference currency for the exchange rate of the ROL until 31 December 2004 at the latest.

By the end of 2004, all legislative changes aiming at making the National Bank of Romania and the Romanian banking system operate in line with the EU criteria shall be adopted according to the established timetable. This implies that the primary objective of the central bank shall be price stability in accordance with the provisions of both the EMU Treaty and the Statute of the European Central Bank. In addition, banking legislation will be improved so as to strengthen the independence of the National Bank of Romania and enhance efficiency of the Romanian banking system in accordance with European standards.

As far as the independence of the National Bank of Romania is concerned, a matter of critical importance in the negotiations, this was manifest ever since the first stage of bank reform by enforcing the provisions of the banking laws issued in 1991. Subsequently, Law No. 101/1998-The NBR Act confirmed central bank independence and the banking laws in force shall be amended by 2004, thereby ensuring the strengthening of National Bank of Romania independence.

Romania has already opened 26 negotiation chapters, of which 12 chapters were provisionally closed. By end-2002, Romania shall open the remaining 4 chapters, of which the Chapter: Free movement of services, to which the National Bank of Romania has technically contributed to, in order to ensure that the acquis communautaire governing services shall be fully taken over by end-2004.