In June, the Romanian Foreign Trade Centre organized a one-day
trade symposium and ceremony to celebrate ten years of successful
cooperation with ITC.
© International Trade Centre, International Trade Forum
- Issue 1/2001
ITC has worked with the Romanian Government on a wide range of
projects to deliver practical services to Romania's business
community. "This is a landmark year, and we would like to thank ITC
for its focused, highly professional approach in helping Romania's
trade community," said Mr. Ovidei Cernei, Director General of
Romania's Department for Foreign Trade and Economic Promotion, in a
joint press release before the event.
Major achievements
Several important achievements emerged from an independent
evaluation of ten years of cooperation between Romania and ITC.
Among them:
• Top-ranked trade information services. The Romanian Foreign
Trade Centre has rapidly emerged as the country's best provider of
trade information services. ITC contributed to the centre's
conceptual framework, web site development and staff training.
• Nationally reputed Romanian Association of Purchasing and
Supply Management. Romanian purchasing experts created this
association in 1996, following a series of ITC training sessions.
Over the last five years, the establishment has trained over 300
Romanian specialists, bringing a new business efficiency to their
companies. Today the association has 35 member companies and is
government-accredited to issue training certificates. Due to their
experience and skill, these Romanian specialists are increasingly
being engaged by ITC to conduct training on international projects
in purchasing and supply management.
• Romanian versions of major international business
publications. Romania is the first country to adapt and translate
three of ITC's top-selling business publications: the Business
Guide to the World Trading System; Trade Secrets; and Secrets of
Electronic Commerce. These practical guides are aimed at helping
the business community improve their export capacity.
Future directions
At the symposium, ITC and the Romanian Government launched a
new, one-year information technology project to inform the Romanian
business community about the implications of the WTO agreements on
international trade in information technology (IT) products, and
increase awareness about global trade opportunities for IT products
and ser-
vices. In addition, ITC will work directly with private firms in
the wooden furniture and garment industries to build new
competitive strengths. Finally, ITC will also continue its work
with the Romanian Foreign Trade Centre in order to deliver a range
of trade promotion services to Romanian businesses.
Partners are key to success
The Ministry of Commerce coordinated the technical cooperation
with Romania's Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Bucharest's
Chamber of Commerce and Industry, the Romanian Association of
Auditors, the Romanian Association of Supply Management and the
Romanian Foreign Trade Centre, all of which were represented at the
symposium.
"If I were asked to highlight the biggest key to success, it
would be the close working relationship with a wide range of
partners in Romania, as well as the Swiss Government and UNDP,"
said J. Denis Bélisle, ITC's Executive Director. "The assessment of
country needs, subsequent design of technical cooperation projects,
their management and their monitoring were done as a collaborative,
country-based process."
For more information, contact Szabolcs Piskolti, Chief, ITC
Office for Arab States and the CIS, at piskolti@intracen.org