The sixth edition of the podcast ‘Giving Meaning to Money’ brings news about the cooperation between the Republic of Moldova and the World Bank, as well as the future plans within this collaboration. The show was launched on the eve of Independence Day and also marks the entry into the fourth decade of partnership between the World Bank and the Republic of Moldova.
The guest of journalist Liliana Barbăroșie is Inguna Dobraja, the Country Director of the World Bank in the Republic of Moldova.
During the interview, the World Bank official discusses subjects such as the challenging period of dealing with the economic consequences of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and what could follow in terms of the support provided by the World Bank to the Republic of Moldova. Additionally, the head of the World Bank office in Chișinău outlines the priorities of the cooperation agenda and explains how the World Bank’s support assists the Republic of Moldova in the necessary reforms for EU accession preparation.
“I believe that the Government needs to maintain this flexibility due to the uncertainties I mentioned and because we don’t know what the next heating season will be like, what winter will bring us. Therefore, I think the Government needs to remain flexible to allocate more resources than planned, but at the same time, it might make sense to review expenditures, some expenditures, for example, to check if the procurement system is efficient, especially for goods and services, to pay attention to investments – how quickly these investments are materialized, because if you wait too long for investments to materialize, they become costly, because if you plan to build a road in a year and the work takes two years, then you need more human and financial resources. For this reason, it’s much more costly. If we look at these things, this is a clear option. I also believe that another possibility is the parallel implementation of reforms. We’ve considered rationalizing the costlier reforms, such as reforms in the services sector, education, health – those that require a lot of budgetary resources. However, we also have the option of considering the rationalization of the school network, the hospital network, for example. Again, these measures won’t bring immediate savings, but the longer we wait to do these things, the more costly they will become.”
In the “Money in Brief” section, the World Bank Country Director, Inguna Dobraja, explained what the World Bank is, what the conditions for loans by the World Bank are, and what it specifically provides, grants or loans?
The full interview can be watched below.