October 06, 2005

Romania: World Bank Finances MCTI Project With $60 mn

Bucharest - The project "Economy based on knowledge", initiated by the Romanian government through the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology (MCTI), will be financed by the World Bank with $60 mn plus the local component of approximately $10 mn .


Negotiations between the World Bank and the Romanian party on financing the project have been recently concluded, and the official announcement will be made public by the minister of Communications, Zsolt Nagy this week.
The project is aimed to provide access of citizens to information in digital format and the decrease of discrepancies of IT&C education for the entire population through the Electronic Networks of the Local Communities (RECL).

Project's pilot stage was launched this year's April, when they published the announcement on the international auction for endowing with IT&C equipments nine locations that have no access to communications and Internet.

After the auction, they bought IT&C equipments, software applications and integration services for the following localities:

Pilu ( Arad County), Albeºtii de Muscel ( Arge º), Lapusnicu Mare (Caraº- Severin ), Corund ( Harghita ), Ostra ( Suceava ), Jurilovca ( Tulcea ), Sinca ( Braºov ), Aninoasa ( Hunedoara ) and Tîrgu Lãpu º ( Maramure º).

Local communication electronic networks (RECL) were built in these localities.

For the next years, they will construct in the rural and urban environment almost 300 local virtual networks that will be a kind of "knowledge centers" and will provide online information and services for the citizens and for the business environment.

Source:  reporter.gr