European Commission approved on Thursday a scheme worth four billion lei (approximately 800 million euros) to support Romanian companies affected by the coronavirus pandemic, informs a press release of the EU Executive.

The scheme was approved under the Temporary Framework on State Aid. Under this system, public support will take the form of subsidized loans and state loan guarantees.

The measures will be managed by the development branch of the Import Export Bank of Romania, EximBank, which will act on behalf of the Romanian state and totally independent of Eximbank’s commercial activities. The system will be open to small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) with a turnover that exceeded 20 million lei (approximately 4 million euros) in 2019, as well as to large enterprises. The measures are aimed at improving access to finance for these companies, which will allow them to continue their activities during and after the coronavirus pandemic, according to Agerpres.

The Commission has found that the measures concerning Romania are in accordance with the conditions set out in the Temporary Framework. The maturity of the loans is limited to six years, the value of the loans corresponds to the level provided in the Temporary Framework in terms of liquidity needs of the beneficiaries, while loans refer to working capital and investment needs and the Romanian authorities, that have set up guarantees to ensure that the aid is effectively transferred to the final beneficiaries, for example by requiring the financing banks to maintain or improve the terms of the loans eligible for the guarantee.