Last year, 16.1% of households were unable to pay on time some of their important current expenses (house maintenance, loan installments, utilities, etc.), according to an analysis of the living conditions of the Romanian population in 2023, conducted by the National Institute of Statistics (INS).The most frequent cases of overdue bill payments in 2023 were those for home maintenance (79.8%) and electricity (75%)."Paying bank installments is a priority for every household. However, 7.0% of households mentioned that, due to their precarious financial situation, they were overdue on various loans (other than loans for house purchase). The lower share of these outstanding debts is mainly explained by the specific nature of these types of payments, which penalize more severely the failure to meet payment deadlines, and by the low frequency of households having to repay loans," emphasizes the INS.In 2023, the share of households with outstanding debts fell by 2.4 percentage points compared to the previous year, and by residence by 2.1 percentage points in urban areas and by 2.9 percentage points in rural areas. In rural areas, 18.2% of households specified that, in 2023, there was at least one situation in which they were unable to pay on timeWhile members of urban households had past-due bills for household maintenance (85.9% of households), in rural areas the highest share of past-due bills was for electricity (84.3% of households).As in 2022, the phenomenon of past-due bills in 2023 was more prevalent among households with dependent children (17.8%), single parent households with at least one minor dependent child (21.2%) and households with two adults with 3 or more minor dependent children (32.9%).The statistical data were obtained through the "Quality of Life Survey", conducted in May 2023, informs the INS.
Romanian director Cristian Mungiu will be part of the jury that will judge the films in the main competition of this year’s Venice Film Festival - Venezia 82. The jury, headed by American director Alexander Payne, includes French director and screenwriter Stéphane Brizé, Italian director and screenwriter Maura Delpero, Iranian director and writer Mohammad Rasoulof, Brazilian actress, writer, and […]
Romania continues to face significant prison overcrowding, according to the Council of Europe’s latest data, released on Friday, July 18. The 2024 Annual Penal Statistics on Prison Populations (SPACE I) show that Romania is among six countries in Europe with severe overcrowding, housing 116 inmates for every 100 available places. The report, which...
Chris Hemsworth returns to Disney+ in August with a new season of the National Geographic documentary series Limitless, this time focused not just on longevity, but on discovering how to live better. Titled Limitless: Live Better Now, the three-part season follows Hemsworth through physical, emotional, and mental challenges across six countries, with one standout episode […]
The Black Sea 200 Regatta 2025, Romania’s first non-stop offshore regatta with a 200 nautical mile route, takes place between July 21 and 27. Now in its first edition, the event brings together more than 10 boats from Romania and Bulgaria, according to the organizers. The endurance course will start and finish in the Romanian […]
The National Environmental Guard has fined an illegally operating zoo in Dâmbovița county, southern Romania, a total of RON 120,000 following a joint inspection that uncovered serious violations, including the lack of environmental authorization and inadequate conditions for wild animals kept in captivity. The zoo was reportedly charging RON 50 per person for entry and […]
The National Cybersecurity Directorate (DNSC) and engineering company Enevo Group have signed a strategic cooperation agreement to strengthen cybersecurity in Romania’s energy sector. The partnership aims to test and develop monitoring and alerting technologies for cyberattacks, and to improve national response coordination to incidents affecting critical infrastructure, the companies said. The agreement focuses on sharing […]
