Economy Minister Spataru: “We are looking for solutions to support the Romanian automotive industry is this difficult period”

The Minister of Economy Florin Spataru visited today the Dacia plant from Mioveni and had discussions with the company’s management regarding the challenges that the automotive industry is facing during this period.

“I had a constant dialogue with the Dacia management, but I also wanted to talk to the employees. I know that in order to overcome the new economic-financial challenges facing the staff here, we need to consider several aspects, but for the moment I have discussed with the Minister of Labor about the need to extend Kurzarbeit. Our priority is to keep people in office,” said Florin Spătaru.

The discussions during the visit focused on finding solutions for the Dacia Mioveni Plant, which has recently had to reduce its working hours or even interrupt its activity, which has led to dissatisfaction among employees.

“The car industry is directly affected by the military conflict in Ukraine, but also by the semiconductor crisis, the crisis of critical raw materials to which was added the pandemic crisis and rising energy prices, but I am glad that Automobile Dacia and Renault Group have made efforts to maintain the company’s activity,” said Florin Spătaru.

Regarding the long-term measures to overcome the semiconductor crisis affecting the entire car industry, Minister Spătaru said that the Ministry of Economy is considering a series of measures to start the exploitation of critical raw materials for semiconductor production and investment in microelectronics through PNRR , a project for which funds of 500 million euros are allocated through the Ministry of Economy.