The Importance Of Regionalization In Improving The Process Of Absorbing European Funds In Romania

The interest to study the impact of regionalization on the absorption of EU funds is a major and timely subject, since on the one hand Member States should reform their institutional architecture and management tools to enable efficient cooperation with European structures, and on the other hand there is huge opportunity for economic and social development funded from European resources whose effective access can only be made based on an appropriate organizational framework. The regionalization process in Romania has experienced delays entailing a disadvantage in terms of the progress in the national socio-economic development. In the present study we aimed to identify the main weaknesses in the way it has been approached the matter of regionalization and decentralization of public administration in Romania. To synthesize this better we conducted a SWOT analysis, which we sought to identify both positive and negative steps that Romania has followed in launching the process of regionalization and decentralization. From the study carried out it can be noticed that the need and importance of regional decentralization in increasing the absorption of European funds is justified by setting strategic priorities at regional level, accompanied by an assessment of projects that bring added value in that they correlate the real and specific regional needs with the development objectives set in the National Development Plan.