IMM Romania requests the creation of support programs for SMEs in 2025, in the context of the downward trend of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) which will intensify in the coming period due to trade imbalances such as the reduction in the number of companies, the number of employees and weak exports.
"The year 2025 must be the year of economic relaunch by creating support programs for SMEs. These support programs must come in a stable, economic and legislative entrepreneurial ecosystem. Not changing the Fiscal Code is a necessary condition to ensure the predictability of business plans and the decrease in the number of normative acts such as the austerity ordinance and the reduction of austerity measures that affect the economic milieu", reads a press release from the employers' confederation sent to AGERPRES on Friday.
Thus, IMM Romania encourages investments by creating incentives for investors and proposes supporting areas with growth potential such as IT, green technology, agriculture and tourism by offering subsidies to SMEs that also stimulate innovation and competitiveness on the international markets.
According to the latest data published by the National Institute of Statistics (INS), the Gross Domestic Product - seasonally adjusted data - did not change in the third quarter of 2024, compared to the first quarter of 2024, but registered a decrease of 0.1% compared to the third quarter of 2023.
Romanian SME representatives say that the value of the Gross Domestic Product can be influenced by the value of exports and imports. According to the information published by the INS, the value of exports in November 2024 was 8.389 billion euros and the value of imports was 11.227 billion euros, with a deficit of 2.837 billion euros. If we refer to the same month of 2023, imports in November 2024 increased by 6.2%, there being a greater increase compared to the increase in exports of 1.6%.
Also, in the January-November 2024 period, there was a 1% decrease in exports and a 3.3% increase in imports, compared to the same period in 2023.
IMM Romania, respectively the former National Council of Small and Medium-sized Private Enterprises in Romania, is a representative employers' confederation, established in 1992, to represent the interests of SMEs and the employers' movement at national and international level in a unified and efficient manner, to promote and supports the development and growth of the competitiveness and performance of the Romanian business milieu