The authorities are late in implementing projects financed with foreign loans or grants. Moreover, parts of the contracts signed with the donors are not fulfilled and the country is thus penalized. The Independent Analytical Center “Expert-Grup” analyzed the 27 reports of the Audit Office, published in the first half of 2014, and established that its recommendations are not implemented. This leads to irrational costs.

In a news conformance at IPN, Tatiana Savva, author of the “Synthesis of the Audit Office decisions for the first quarter of 2014”, said a thematic report of the Audit Office shows the authorities have allocated almost 110 million lei since 2008 for training medical staff with budget money, but the number of doctors continues to decrease. Though it seems that there are many dentists in Moldova, their number is by 15% lower than the European average.

According to Tatiana Savva, the state does not have efficient mechanisms to make the students trained with budget money to remain in the health system and to agree to work where they are needed, even if they signed a contract pledging to work for at least three years at the institution to which they are assigned. The Audit Office reports say the procedures for employing medical staff by contest are not obeyed.

The author also analyzed the reports concerning sustainable management of the environment, soil, water and agriculture. The Audit Office found that the authorities didn’t create efficient mechanisms for benefitting from the money provided by donors. Therefore, the country is regularly penalized for not fulfilling the terms of the financing agreements.

Tatiana Savva noted that the Moldovan authorities remember that there are water-related problems in the country only when it is drought. A Water Law was adopted, but there is no strategy for implementing it, while the national legislation in the field wasn’t adjusted to the international standards. No clear measures were taken to prevent the pollution of water sources. There are controversial irrigation projects and it’s not known how much money is needed to ensure the protection of water sources. There are also no mechanisms for protecting the soil.

As to the management of funds in agriculture, a large part of the money offered by the foreign donors is not used and it’s not true that there is no money for supporting the farmers, as the authorities assert. The authorities do not take the necessary steps to inform the farmers how they can access these funds.

The “Expert-Grup” study was made within the project “Budget Process in Moldova: Monitoring Transparency and Promoting Public Control” that is implemented with the financial support of the Good Governance Program of Soros Foundation Moldova.