Country Profile: Romania

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Factfile

Area

238,391 km sq

Population

21,504,442

Capital

Bucharest

Official languages

Romanian 91% (official), Hungarian 6.7%, Romany
(Gypsy) 1.1%, other 1.2%

Currency

Leu

Religion

Eastern Orthodox 86.8%, Protestant 7.5%, Roman
Catholic 4.7%,

Literacy Rate

98%

Economy Summary

GDP: $245.5billion
Of labour force (9.35 million); agriculture 31.6%, industry
30.7%, services 37.7%

Major trading partners

Italy, Germany, France,
Turkey, UK, Russi

History

Romania is a country located in South-East Central Europe, North of the Balkan Peninsula, on the Lower Danube, within and outside the Carpathian arch, bordering on the Black Sea. Almost all of the Danube Delta is located within its territory. It shares a border with Hungary and Serbia to the west, Ukraine and the Republic of Moldova to the northeast, and Bulgaria to the south.

The territory's recorded history includes periods of rule by Dacians, the Roman Empire, the Kingdom of Hungary, and the Ottoman Empire. As a nation-state, the country was formed by the merging of Moldavia and Wallachia in 1859 and it gained recognition of its independence in 1878. Later, in 1918, they were joined by Transylvania, Bukovina and Bessarabia. At the end of World War II, parts of its territories were occupied by the USSR and Romania became a member of the Warsaw Pact. With the fall of the Iron Curtain in 1989, Romania started a series of political and economic reforms. After a decade of post-independence economic problems, Romania made economic reforms such as low flat tax rates in 2005 and joined the European Union in January 1, 2007. While Romania's income level remains one of the lowest in the European Union, reforms have increased the growth speed. Romania is now an upper-middle income country economy. Romania has the 9th largest territory and the 7th largest population among the European Union member states. Its capital and largest city is Bucharest the 6th largest city in the EU with 1.9 million people.

Environment

Nearly 50% of all the land in Romania is protected natural resource reserves. Romania also has the largest forest reserve in all of Europe, they have made an agrrement to leave this land for natural park and resoucre and water conservation, rather then industry. Aside from the vast amount of Bears and Wolves that occupy these huge forests in Romania, the country is also home to over 400 different species of mammals, giving Romania a sense of national pride for their natural environmental beauty. Nearly 5% of all of Romania is reserved for natural park, the most notable being the Danube Delta, which is the largest protected and undisturbed watershed in Europe.

Romania has four very distinct seasons, changing between temperate and continental. Their winters tend to be very cold and their summers tend to be very hot. Romania has payed particular attention to global warming and climate change since they have such a vast amount of natural beauty and reserves to protect.

Economy

Romania is considered to be an upper middle income economy with a GDP of around 264 billion dollars. Since the decline of Communism in Romania in 1989, at first the economy was weak, but since 2000, due to periods of decreasing unemployment, decreasing inflation and high growth, the Romanian economy has been able to expand and on January 1st 2007, they became a member of the European Union. Also Romania has an extremely low debt rate as compared to other large European countries, which is another contributing factor to their success. Furthermore, Romania has an incredible trade surplus, Romania's main exports are clothing and textiles, industrial machinery, electrical and electronic equipment, metallurgic products, raw materials, cars, military equipment, software, pharmaceuticals, fine chemicals, and agricultural products (fruits, vegetables, and flowers). Generally Romania tades mostly with members of the European Union, mainly Germany and Italy.

Also, Romania has changed from a progressive tax rate, to a flat tax rate, which has allowed them to have tremendous gains, expecially in the private sector. This tax plan also encourages business and growth, nearly 25% of all employees in Romania work in the agricultural industry as well. This makes Romania one of the largest agricultural prodeucers in Europe. Romania has been attracting tremendous amounts of foreign investment since 2000 and has been considered the world's second fastest economic reformer.

Culture

Romania has its own very unique culture, being at the crossroads of Europe, the meeting place of Western, Easter and Southern Europe as well as the Balkans, yet they do not generally relate themselves to any of those regions...They have a culture formed from the Romans, Greeks, Dacians, Byzantines and Slavic people, they are also know for their art masterpieces and musical composers, Romania is also home to the fictional Dracula character, who is named after Vlad III Dracula

Future Outlook

Since 1998, Romania has worked to strengthen their relations with the West, especially the United States and European Union members. Currently Romania is a member of NATO, the World Trade Organization, the World Bank, European Union and International Monetary Fund. Aside with strengthening relations with the West, Romania also seeks to strengthen its relations with the Eastern European former Soviet Block and particularly Hungary and Moldova, because of their similar language and culture. In the years to come, Romania will seek to capitalize on the strength of its growing economy and its natural resource wealth and abundance.

The government of Romania has adopted many policies to combat and research climate change, with special interest in limiting greenhouse gas emissions. Romania has taken initiative, creating the infrastructure as well as supplying the education necessary to implement the changes they wish to make. Some of the policies that Romania has created are promoting energy production and natural resources, energy efficiency and landfill allocations.

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