The Romanian Finance Ministry recently launched for public debate two projects that will help eliminate or merge 92 taxes and tariffs which bring very little money to the state budget.

Following consultations carried out by the ministry with other ministries and state institutions, it decided to eliminate 14 taxes and merge 78 others in order to simplify things for the taxpayers.

„We are doing a significant step towards achieving some objectives of my minister's mandate. First of all, to simplify the tax system – with positive effects for the taxpayers who will not spend that much time at the counter anymore, but also for the administration, because we will eliminate administrative costs for taxes which bring small income,” Finance Minister Ioana Petrescu said in a statement.

For example, the tax for issuing a simple electronic passport, which is RON 22, and the tariff for guidance in registering a firm at the Commerce Registry’s Office, which is RON 19.8 for one hour, will both be canceled.

The two documents were published on Wednesday, May 14, and the Ministry awaits public comments or opinion for 10 days from publication date. 

However, even if this Government initiative somehow simplifies the system for some taxpayers, it doesn’t bring any important tax elimination or reduction which would have a strong impact for the local business environment.

Andrei Chirileasa, andrei@romania-insider.com