Virgil Popescu, Minister of Economy, Energy and Business Environment, told a television station on Monday that more than 50,000 companies will benefit from non-reimbursable European funds on the first two financing schemes for SMEs.
“Last week, the evaluation of Measure 1 started, we sent the contracts to the first 5,400 companies and at present 3,000 contracts signed by entrepreneurs have returned,” said Minister Popescu.
The next almost 3,000 contracts are ready to go to contractors, and by the end of this week or the beginning of next week, the 9 territorial agencies and the MEEMA implementation unit will complete the evaluation for all 29,000 applications submitted for the 2,000 euros microgrant.
Minister Popescu underlined that a new registration session for Measure 1 will be opened for the remaining budget from the first session, and individual and family enterprises will also be eligible for micro-grants, according to the latest measures adopted by the Government.
The Ministry of Economy will also send on Tuesday the first financing contracts to the applicants eligible for state aid of 2,000-150,000 euros from Measure 2, Minister Popescu announced.
He mentioned that the evaluation for the 22,226 companies registered for scheme two started on Monday, and the interaction is, as with all budgetary funds developed through MEEMA, a semi-automatic one, without direct interaction between the entrepreneur and the ministry.
Minister Virgil Popescu also announced that this week he intends to open scheme three.
“The investment scheme will probably be open for 90 days, because there will have to be a project, a feasibility study and we will not rush people. Then, monthly, we will evaluate the submitted projects and we will actually start the payments after the evaluation “, explained Virgil Popescu.
The Minister of Economy also said that, on Friday, he would like to launch the Electric-Up program, through which SMEs and HoReCa operators will be able to obtain grants of 100,000 euros each to install solar panels and car charging stations. electric or electric hybrid.