Government promises smart-cards and online university malls

Romanian officials attending the “unITy in building the New Economy” seminar, organised by Swedish Embassy and Ericsson Romania in Bucharest yesterday, reminded participants that the new economy is an extraordinary opportunity for Romania. However, any support for the sector is still in the “we’re thinking about it” and “we’ll do it” stage.

The Ministry of Communications and Information Technology (MCTI) this month will propose a special procedure for privatising the Romanian IT industry, binding the buying companies to maintain the high-tech component in the core business, Communications minister Dan Nica yesterday told the “unITy in building the New Economy” seminar.

“We want high-tech and we don’t want to force high-tech companies into a competition with other companies dealing in consumer goods industry, for instance.

Therefore, along with the Privatisation Authority, we will come up this month with a clear procedure for privatising this industry,” Dan Nica said. The Romanian official did not specify the number of companies left to be privatised in this field, though.

Dan Nica added that the electronic signature Law would be passed by the specialised parliamentary committee this week. The law is part of a series that the MCTI official had said he wanted promulgated in February this year, ever since his installation in late 2000.

Nica also announced during the seminar that Posta Romana (Romanian Postal Company) would introduce smart-cards on the market. This project’s funding will come from an external loan worth $50 million.

MCTI is also working on Romania’s official trade and profession list in order to include some new ones, connected to the new economy, such as “tele-worker.”

In his turn, Deputy Varujan Pambuccian, chairman of the parliamentary committee for IT, spoke in favour of significant IT industry investments.

“The regime before the Revolution left us with about 44% of the active population working in the industry and with wishful thinking about those times we used to be the wheat provider of the entire Europe, but not its baker,” Pambuccian said.

“The only solution is to make massive investments in the IT industry, because the added value here is high. Moreover, computer is no strange thing, but something desired, for most Romanians. Unfortunately, few can afford it.”