Foreign investors consider they can work efficiently in Moldova only if the Government creates conditions for attracting investments at least like those in Romania, Hungary, Poland, Serbia or Montenegro. Investors’ opinions were collected by expert Viorel Chivriga, who is the authors of the study “Attraction of foreign direct investments to the Republic of Moldova: analysis of impediments”. The survey commissioned by the Foreign Policy Association (APE), was presented in a Press Club meeting at IPN.
The conditions wanted by the investors include appropriate infrastructure, access to financial resources and administrative support. Viorel Chivriga said the investors pay lower taxes in the mentioned countries. They are offered direct financing for each opened workplace, lower charges on infrastructure services and electric power, new/modernized industrial areas with all the necessary infrastructure. Considerable attention is paid to the ensuring of security and protection of investors, predictability in business and common rules of activity for the whole business community, enforcement of the law and non-interference of the state in private businesses.
The instability of the budgetary-fiscal policies is one of the major risk factors for investors’ businesses. Viorel Chivriga said the inspection bodies of the country have now a plan of fines and financial penalties as a source of income and such practices reduce considerably the investors’ interest in Moldova. The constraints on businesses increase in number, reducing significantly the investment attractiveness. The country’s image abroad does the state a disservice. The poverty, frozen armed conflict and the lack of information are plausible examples in this respect.
Viorel Chivriga recommends working out and adopting a national strategy for developing free enterprise zones and industrial parks, implementing strategies aimed at developing the SMEs, based on the principles of initiative in favor of small companies, developing an attractive and stable investment climate by creating institutional, legal, fiscal and other types of conditions, especially for removing the obstacles placed to businesses, optimizing state control system, and developing the capital market.
The Press Club meeting was staged by the APE in partnership with the NATO Information and Documentation Center in Moldova, with support from the Think Tank Fund – Open Society Foundations and East Europe Foundation, with the resources provided by the Government of Sweden through the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Denmark/DANIDA.
