Nicoleta Gherasi

The Ministry of Energy will come to Government with an emergency ordinance by which the repeat offences of energy distributors and suppliers will be punished at the level of the company's turnover, announced, on Tuesday, the Minister of Energy, Virgil Popescu, announced.

Air passenger transport in Romania decreased by 26.5% in H1 2021, y-o-y, from 4,077,800 passengers to 2,997,000 passengers, according to centralised data with the National Institute of Statistics (INS).

Giurgiu, Calafat, Otopeni and Nadlac II were the border checkpoints where most tourist arrivals in Romania were recorded in the first half of 2021, according to data centralised by the National Institute of Statistics (INS). Thus, in Giurgiu, 364,400 arrivals were reported, in Calafat 328,200, in Otopeni 184,100 and in Nadlac II 161,600 arrivals.

The volume of firewood sold last year was of 9.128 million cubic meters, and the volume of carving wood rose up to 3.324 million cubic meters. The volume of timber and other semi-manufactured totalled 35,000 cubic meters, according to the centralized data from the National Institute of Statistics.

The National Meteorological Administration (ANM) has issued a Code Orange alert of persistent heat wave and particularly severe thermal discomfort, valid, on Monday, in 16 counties and the municipality of Bucharest, and a Code Yellow warning, valid in eight counties.

The general consolidated budget recorded a deficit of 19.17 billion lei (1.68pct of GDP) in the second quarter of this year, by 10.74 billion lei below the level forecast for the reference period of 29.91 billion lei (2.08pct of GDP), according to a report published on Friday by the Ministry of Finance.

The number of registrations of individuals and legal persons increased in the first half of 2021 by 62.55 pct compared to the same period of the previous year, to 79,734, of which 53,844 are limited liability companies (LLCs), according to data centralized by the National Office of the Trade Register (ONRC), consulted by AGERPRES.

Tax exempting the minimum wage could be a solution for keeping the workforce in the country, and such measure will start on January 1, 2022 in a private sector, which could be the hospitality industry, Minister of the Economy Claudiu Nasui told a news conference on Wednesday. "The labour shortage has been an old problem of Romania, before the pandemic.

The Iasi-based Antibiotice pharmaceuticals company has reported an H1 2021 business turnover of 163.39 million lei, up 11% from 2020, according to a company's press statement released on Monday. From its H1 2021 revenues, the company paid the public healthcare system 13.5 million lei in the clawback tax, which influenced the profitability rate.

The members of the Council of Administration of the Romanian National Bank (BNR) estimate that economic activity will continue to grow in the second and third quarter at greater pace than estimated in May, but in gradual deceleration in relation to the first quarter, according to the minutes of the monetary policy session of July 7, 2021.