An additional 100 million euros assigned to SME National Guarantee Fund

Agerpres, ROMANIAN ECONOMIC HIGHLIGHTS, October 18, 2010. The government decided on Oct. 13 to allot extra money to the National Guarantee and Counter-guarantee Fund for Small and Medium Sized Enterprises (SME), i.e. 100 million euros more for 2010, to ease the absorption of European funds by these companies. According to Executive spokeswoman Ioana Muntean, the government adopted an Emergency Ordinance in its Oct. 13 session to improve the absorption of European funds. Under the new law, private investors will be supported in co-financing projects funded with European grants by receiving government guarantees, Muntean explained. "This measure has a dual purpose, i.e. to support private companies on one hand and to improve the absorption of European funds on the other. This law extended the number of beneficiaries of the support programme to those running projects for the Romanian economy financed from European funds. It is about government guarantees awarded through the SME National Guarantee Fund for the loans taken by the beneficiaries of this programme to finance the projects' investment component," added Muntean. Administrative units that are implementing projects financed through the Instrument for Structural Policies for the Pre-Accession programme and those that have ongoing tourism infrastructure projects can access the support funding