Infrastructure

This subfield covers the main relevant indicators for the transport, utilities and communications infrastructure. It is important to note that the data that allows comparative analyses with EU countries in time are quantitative, rather than qualitative (for instance, the state of Romanian infrastructure is evaluated by the European Commission based on World Economic Forum Global Competitiveness Report at 2.6 for rail infrastructure and 2.7 for road infrastructure in 2016-2017 – the last position in the EU, where 1 means underdeveloped, and 7 extensive and efficient). [read more]

The volume of transported passengers is an important indicator of well-being, not to mention that it directly impacts the development of various economic sectors (by decreasing labour force costs). The volume of passenger transport relative to GDP, that shows to what degree this field has contributed to economic growth, has been decreasing in Romania, but is close to EU average. The volume of freight transport relative to GDP is a key element in a nation’s economic development, but the volume of goods transported by road or rail in Romania has been under significant decrease recently, mostly due to poor infrastructure, but also because of low demand. For instance, in 2015 just 59% of total goods were transported by road, while the volume of transported goods by rail was 5% higher. We can evaluate the quality of the transport system by looking at investment. In Romania, this investment has been constantly decreasing in the last years: for instance, in 2012 Romania invested just 2.32% of its GDP in road transport, compared to 7.70% in the case of Poland or 8.19% in the case of Croatia. Romania invests even less in the rail transport system (relative to GDP): eight times less than Poland, which might be an explanation for the quality of this type of infrastructure. In absolute terms, in 2015 Romania invested in the road infrastructure 18.72 times less than Poland.

In modern economies, communications infrastructure (internet, mobile services, data servers, etc.) has an increasingly prominent role. Although in Romania data transfer is very fast, there are problems about how this infrastructure is used economically. For instance, at the level of the EU, in 2017, in the Digital Economy and Society Index, Romania was on the 28th place: the degree of digitalization of economy, including the digitalization of public services, and the level of digital competences, are low. For instance, just 56% of Romanians use the internet (compared to EU average, 78%), and just 7% of Romanian SMEs sell online (compared to EU average, 17%).