Romania's unemployment rate grew slightly to 6.9 percent in the third quarter of 2010, from 6.8 percent in the previous quarter, according to the country’s statistics institute INS. The jobless rate was also higher compared with a rate of 6.8 percent in the third quarter of 2009, the statistics show.

The Romanian Central Bank (BNR) has decided to keep the key interest rate at 6.25 percent after its first monetary policy meeting of the year.

Romanian group InterAgro, owned by local investor Ioan Niculae, has decided to close down four of its fertilizers factories until April this year, after having announced plans to close down two more at the end of last year.

The Romanian movie 'If I Want to Whistle, I Whistle' will have its premiere in the US on January 5 and will run in New York until January 18. Director Florin Serban and producer Daniel Mitulescu will attend the screening at Film Forum New York, starting 8 PM, and the official launching afterparty.

Fashion retailer C&A will open a 1,200 sqm store in Family Center Botosani in April this year, according to Oasis Development, the developers of the project. The shopping center, which is already running, is thus fully let. The center was opened in November last year, following a EUR 7 million investment.

Banca Comercială Romana (BCR) has granted EUR 517 million of loans in the First House 1 and 2 programs, more than a third of its quota within the program. Most of the loans were granted in Bucharest – over 4,000 loans, worth a total of EUR 196 million.

Best Film Fest, a film festival which will reward the best Romanian movies and actors of 2010 will take place in Bucharest between January 28 and February 3. The 11th edition of the festival will be organized at the Studio cinema in Bucharest.

Romania-Insider.com starts a series of articles on intercultural communication, focusing on practical aspects that will help you deal with your Romanian business partners as well as with partners in the Eastern Europen region, while bridging the cultural differences between them. Read the introductory article of this series below and feel free to send us your ideas or examples of actual situations where more knowledge on intercultural communication would have come in handy.

Romania needs more profound reforms on the social allowances and occupation segments of the public sector and these could take one or two years, which is why joining the euro zone could be delayed from the planned 2015, according to the governor of the Romanian Central Bank (BNR), Mugur Isarescu (in picture).

As many as 400 foreign tourists, among whom British, French and Americans, have made bookings and are waited for this winter at the Ice Hotel at Balea Lac, the only ice hotel in Eastern Europe.

One of the advisers of Romanian democrat liberal Gheorghe Flutur, president of the Suceava County Council, northeastern Romania, will walk the distance between Vienna, Austria, and Suceava to promote the tourism project "Pilgrim in Bucovina", financed with European funds.

Energy company CEZ has sold its 9.15 percent participation in EnergoNuclear, the company which will build the 3 and 4 nukes in Cernavoda project in Romania, to Nuclearelectrica. CEZ has previously announced its plan to withdraw from the project while focusing on its home market in the Czech Republic and consolidate existing investments abroad.