ROMANIA-RUSSIA The strategy of the Romanian-Russian Chamber of Commerce and Industry for the 2009-2015 period

The Romanian-Russian Chamber of Commerce (CCIRR) is in the process of implementing a strategy for the development of exports and economic cooperation between the two countries, valid until 2015. The document stipulates that the economic, cultural and political relationships between Romania and the Russian Federation can play an important, and in some cases essential part in the current context.

The core principle of its activity which the CCIRR is promoting is the change of the importance granted to the existing avenues of action from the West to the East, as well as the finding of potential business partners from the Russian Federation and other member states of the Commonwealth of Independent States, interested in investment projects in Romania.

The management of the Chamber also wants to convince potential partners to invest, directly or indirectly, in the projects identified by the CCIRR which correspond to the common interests and which have as their goal the construction in the Russian Federation and in other countries which are members of the Commonwealth of Independent States, of means and mechanisms specific to the market economy, which would support the Romanian entrepreneurs in their export of products and services.

The means of implementation of this strategy include the creation in the CCIRR, of a department dedicated to promoting products, services, investment programs, the professional training programs etc. The activity of this department will also rely on the involvement of the territorial and bilateral chambers, of other existing professional structures and with expertise in that line of business field in domestically and in the target countries. The chamber also handles the organization of the participation of companies in Romania with product offers and services in promotional events in the target territories in the East. The main contribution of the Chamber will be the provision of comprehensive information of the partners about the presence of Romanian companies at these events.

Another means of implementation is the creation at selected locations of the target territories, with an environment opened to the Romanian offers, of commercial and technical representative offices, of commercial ventures with mixed capital, of consulting firms.

The CCIRR continues to facilitate the opening in Romania of representative offices, companies with fully foreign/joint equity, consulting firms for the foreign partners with which cooperation relations have been established, as well as the creation in Romania of one/several investment banks with shared Romanian and Russian equity, which would support the conducting on the territory of Romania of private investment projects and using the public private partnership system with the participation of Russian investors.

The strategic objectives of the Chamber include attracting Russian investors to help Romania's tourism grow, in particular spa tourism, supporting Russian investors in order to allow them to participate in the construction of the "Romania - European Energy Hub" project, as well as the granting of mutual fiscal facilities between Romania and the Eastern countries, which, aside from compensating for costs, would allow operations such as clearing, term settlements, factoring etc.

The financing sources of the strategy proposed by the CCIRR are the creation of closed-end investment funds / dedicated investment companies, with mixed public-private equity.

Other alternatives include investment banks, as depositories of the investment funds, guarantees of investors for the participation in the domestic and international calls for bids, as well as attractive structures for the deposits of individuals and companies, commodity exchanges etc. The new banks will be extremely attractive in the near future, as they have not been involved in maximum risk lending and would not have non-performing loans.

The CCIRR also proposes as a financing source attracting banks from Romania and the Russian Federation (Eximbank, the Bank of Foreign Trade of Russia, BII, BICE, etc.) into export - import operations (clearing, leasing, factoring, guarantees etc).