Farmers and businesspeople from Moldova annually give unofficial payments of millions of lei to different state institutions, the results of an opinion poll launched on April 22 by Transparency International – Moldova show, Info-Prim Neo reports. The director of the Moldovan TI office, Lilia Carasciuc, has told a news conference that about 39% of representatives of peasant households and 53% of the businesspeople interviewed have given bribes to different institutions. 80.7% of the farmers who contacted certain institutions unofficially paid to get visas, 57.2% - to customs officers, 51.2% - to police, 42.5% - to medical institutions and 36.3% - to education institutions. At the same time, 49.4% of the interviewed businesspeople unofficially gave money to medical institutions, 45.5% - to customs, 44% - to police, 41% - to education institutions and 31.9% - to fiscal inspectors. The estimative amount of the unofficial payments made by businesspeople in 2007 is deemed to stand at 310 million lei. The average bribe varies between 133 lei left in passport-issuing offices and 5,744 lei -- in courts. Farmers unofficially paid about 590 million lei. On average they paid from 108 lei to electricity controllers to 2,489 lei to courts. Speaking about the level of corruption perception, people are more skeptical. According to Ianina Spinei, an economist for Transparency International – Moldova, farmers rate corruption on the third place among the main problems they face, the first two being the poverty and high unemployment. The businessmen consider the corruption to be the second after the high taxes in doing business. Most of the interviewees consider as the most important causes of corruption spreading in Moldova the small salaries, not sanctioning the corrupt people and the Government’s unserious attitude in addressing the issue. In the respondents’ opinion, most often they resort to unofficial payments in medical institutions, in relationships with the police, teachers and customs officers. Although 60% of the interviewed consider as unacceptable to pay unofficially, 76% of the farmers and 81% of businessmen are willing to give bribes in difficult situations. As efficient measures to eradicate corruption, the interviewees names harshening sanctions on the ones giving and taking bribes, raising wages, applying norms of ethical behavior in the public service, promoting functionaries depending on merits, informing the population on the risks implied by corruption and verifying the income declarations of public servants. The study has been carried out within a program designed to enhance the Moldovan civil society’s monitoring ability, implemented by the Educational Development Agency. The program is funded by the Millennium Challenge Corporation and managed by the USAID. The poll was performed by CBS-AXA on 1,105 interviewed farmers and 514 businesspeople, from 23 February to 10 March, 2008.