Romania has made progress in improving its business environment. However, licensing remains a significant source of complexity and administrative burden, disproportionately affecting SMEs and start-ups. This chapter provides an in-depth assessment of Romania’s business licensing system, relying on a rich dataset tracking 502 licences related to commerce, industrial and service activities. It offers a granular analysis of sector-specific licences, with a special focus on commerce and service licences, identifying priority areas for simplification to reduce unnecessary barriers to entrepreneurship.
Business Licensing Reforms in Romania
Abstract
This chapter assesses the licensing requirements for commerce and service activities, based on a detailed analysis of the licences included in the updated Business Licensing Inventory developed by the OECD. It first presents an overview of the key features and shortcomings of the business licensing system. It then presents a more granular analysis of the complexity of individual and group of licences with a special attention for the commerce and service licences, which are the main focus of the proposed simplification measures. This granular assessment includes a sub-sector analysis focusing on activity-specific licences to identify effective and suitable levers for simplification.
The chapter refers to licence as a broad term encompassing the different legal instruments and terms in use in Romania. However, a general rule or set of principles regarding the legal relation between different licences is currently not in place. For instance, instruments called “licences” or “permits” may produce the same legal effects in practice, depending on the preference of the lawmakers when the regulation was issued. In addition, there are cases in which the same terminology might have different compliance requirements. The term aviz, which could be translated as opinion, in some cases has a mandatory character.
This section presents an assessment of the Romanian business licensing system building on the data collected through the Business Licensing Inventory and discussions held with the authorities responsible for issuing business licensing in Romania. It first presents the main features of the Business Licensing Inventory. It then identifies the main shortcoming of the Romanian business licensing system.
A key finding is that the system is highly fragmented, with limited coordination across issuing authorities and limited consistency across licensing procedures. The time required to obtain a licence is long, although the actual processing time can be shorter for some licensing, indicating opportunities for shortening required processing times. A major bottleneck is the limited application of “silence is consent,” which unnecessarily delay the issuing of licences.
The Business Licensing Inventory
The Business Licensing Inventory1 includes information on 502 licences issued by 65 Romanian authorities, including ministries, subordinated bodies and independent authorities. The Inventory represents a comprehensive mapping of the entire business licensing system, collecting detailed information on all relevant procedures, documentation and steps to request and obtain a licence. The Inventory is structured around three blocks: 1) information to identify the licence; 2) objectives and legislation; and 3) access, delivery and renewals (Figure 2.1).
Source: OECD Business Licensing Inventory.
One of the key features of the Inventory is that it includes the Statistical Classification of Economic Activities in the European Community (NACE codes), known as CAEN codes in Romania. The CAEN codes classify a business according to its activity. The Inventory links each licence to CAEN codes. This feature of the Inventory allows government officials and potentially also business to easily pinpoint and link economic activities to licences (Box 2.1). This is a novelty for Romania, where CAEN codes were sometimes identified in the legislation related to each licence but where a systematic mapping of licences to business activities was lacking.
The EU NACE Regulation No 1893/2006 allows EU Member States to use a national version of the classification system derived from NACE. The European Commission revises the NACE codes to reflect structural changes in the economy. In Romania, the national equivalent is CAEN codes (Classification of Economic Activities, Clasificarea Activităților din Economia Națională in Romanian), which closely follows the EU NACE system. On 1 January 2025, Romania adopted a new revision, CAEN Rev 3, to reflect the new advancements in technology, environmental sustainability, and emerging industries, in line with NACE Rev 2.1.
The updated version contributes to: i) modernising classifications by incorporating activities related to technology, digital transformation, and renewable energy; ii) aligning with EU taxonomy to enhance transparency for sustainability reporting; and ii) improving accuracy by providing clearer definitions and updated activity groupings to avoid ambiguities.
The Business Licensing Inventory reflects integrates the latest update of CAEN code (CAEN Rev 3).
Source: European Parliament and Council (2006[1]), Romanian National Institute of Statistics (2025[2]).
Additionally, in the Business Licensing Inventory, licences are classified according to different criteria, including the sector they apply to. The classification by sector includes four categories: services, commerce, industry, and a category called “general” in the cases where licences apply transversally to more than one sector. Box 2.2 provides the definition for the service and commerce economic sectors, which are the focus of the simplification measures identified in this analysis.2
Services cover traditional items, such as travel and transportation and items, such as communications, financial and computer services, royalties and licence fees, and many types of other business services that are becoming increasingly important in international transactions.
Commerce includes both internal (retail and wholesale) and external (import and export) classifications of commerce.
Wholesale and retail trade: retailing and wholesaling industries (commonly referred to as the distributive trades sector) represent the intermediate steps in the distribution of merchandise between producers and consumers of goods. Wholesale is the resale (sale without transformation) of new and used goods to retailers, business-to-business trade. Retail trade is the resale (sale without transformation) of new and used goods mainly to the general public for personal or household consumption or utilisation. They include activities such as:
Wholesale of food, beverages and tobacco;
Retail sale of food, beverages and tobacco in specialised stores;
Other specialised wholesale;
Retail sale in non-specialised stores.
Licences are also classified according to the scope of application:
Operating licence: these are licences such as the functioning agreement and the functioning authorisation issued by municipalities. They grant the right to conduct business operations.
General licences: these licences are generally required for different economic activities, cutting across industrial, commerce and services activities. In addition, general licences are required to ensure compliance with environmental, health and safety requirements, while protecting public interest. These include:
Environmental licences: these ensure compliance of business activities with environmental regulations and standards.
Health and sanitary licences: these ensure compliance of business activities with health and sanitary regulations and standards.
Safety permits, such as fire safety and civil protection licences: these ensure compliance of business activities with safety standards. These are usually linked to the safety of the buildings where the economic activities are carried out.
Sector-specific licences: depending on the sector, there may be additional licenses which are sector- or activity-specific.
Labour and employment-related licences: business owners may also need to comply with labour laws when starting an activity, expanding or hiring. Depending on the types of employment contracts, there might be specific licensing requirements, such as in the case of temporary work agents.
Most of the licences included in the Inventory apply to the service sector (333 licences or 66% of all licences collected). Most of the service licences are required for highly regulated economic activities, such as finance, banking, and health. Licences for commerce and industry are mostly for non-highly regulated activities. The total number of licences for non-highly regulated activities is 296.
Number of licences for highly regulated and non-highly regulated economic activities, by economic sector
Note: The licensing procedures classified as “General” are those that can apply to more than one sector. The group of non-highly regulated includes all the licences labelled as “General” and “Specific” in the column “Group” of the Inventory.
Source: OECD Business Licensing Inventory.
Key shortcomings of the business licensing system
Information on licensing requirements is fragmented
Business licensing information is often scattered across various platforms and institutions, making it difficult for entrepreneurs to retrieve necessary information efficiently. There is no unified platform that consolidates all licensing information. Entrepreneurs often have to visit multiple websites and contact different agencies to piece together the information. This fragmentation leads to inefficiencies and delays in obtaining licences, particularly detrimental for SMEs, micro companies and start-ups.
Moreover, the existing scattered information on licensing procedures is not always clear and standardised. Some institutions provide accessible information on their websites, while others only offer guidelines that are technical and hard to understand. This inconsistency in presenting information complicates the licensing process. Checklists and simplified instructions are not always available, making it difficult for entrepreneurs to follow the procedures accurately. Given this complexity, entrepreneurs often need to visit multiple institutions to understand the applicable procedures or seek assistance from lawyers and experts to navigate the system and prevent further delays.
Information and structured guidance on the business licensing process, including the required sequence of application steps, is often unavailable. As a result, entrepreneurs must research on their own which licences apply to their business, which is time-consuming, inefficient and creates a risk that a business may overlook a required licence and unknowingly fail to meet regulatory standards.
The complexity of licensing terminology is compounded by the interchangeable use of terms such as licence, permit, approval, authorisation and certificate across different regulations and administrative bodies. For example, in many OECD countries, a permit is typically a temporary or conditional authorisation granted for a specific activity or purpose, while a licence is a more permanent form of permission, often required for professional activities or businesses. In Romania, however, these terms are used interchangeably, which can lead to further confusion. This lack of standardisation creates uncertainty for businesses and investors, as the scope and legal implications of each term are often unclear. Moreover, some licences are called aviz, which can be translated as a non-binding opinion. In practice, however, aviz may carry mandatory requirements in certain contexts, blurring the distinction between advisory and compulsory procedures.
A monitoring and evaluation framework for business licensing is not in place. Many licensing authorities do not consistently collect data on key indicators such as the number of licence applications, approvals, refusals, or the reasons for rejection. The lack of structured data collection and analysis limits the ability to identify inefficiencies and improve the licensing process. This gap reduces transparency and hinders efforts to address challenges faced by entrepreneurs.
The “silence is consent” principle is marginally applied
The tacit approval or “silence is consent’’ principle was introduced in Romania in 2003 through the Emergency Ordinance 27/2003. Authorisations are considered granted if the public administration does not respond to the applicant within the term provided by law for its issuance. This principle is intended to streamline administrative processes and reduce delays, but its practical application is hindered by several factors.
Emergency Ordinance no. 27/2003, stipulates that “silence is consent” applies to procedures for issuing and/or renewing authorisations, permits, notices, licences, approvals and reauthorisations as a result of the expiration, the suspension period of authorisations or the fulfilment of the measures established by the competent control bodies. The text says that “tacit approval applies to all authorisations issued by public authorities, except for those issued in the field of nuclear activities, those concerning the regime of firearms, ammunition and explosives, the regime of drugs and precursors, as well as authorisations in the field of national security”. This general definition of application made the law on ‘‘silence is consent’’ difficult to implement in practice.
According to the feedback from Romanian administrative bodies and experts, the application of “silence is consent’’ has fallen short of the expected results because the legal text (Government Emergency Ordinance 27/2003, modified by the Law 157/2010 and Law 187/2012) regulating its scope and applicability lacks clarity. In the absence of specific provisions, courts’ decisions have often provided that administrative silence does not equal approval. An example of this is the High Court of Cassation’s decision no 13/2013 of 16 September 2013 which ruled that, in construction and urbanism procedures, the administration’s silence does not correspond to “silence is consent” (High Court of Cassation, 2013[6]).
Evidence collected in the Inventory confirms the limited application of “silence is consent” for business licensing. As shown in the first column of Figure 2.3, for 69.3% of the licences included in the Inventory, ‘‘silence is consent’’ is not applied as the competent authorities need to provide an answer to the applicant. Therefore, for most of the licences, an absence of decision from the competent authority within the legal deadlines corresponds to the impossibility of carrying out the economic activity for which the licence is requested, resulting in delays.
Distribution of licences, based on the consequences of the absence of decision by the authorising authority
Note: The “Other” category refers to cases in which activities might be carried out without obtaining the licence, with however limitations and additional costs. For instance, the economic operators for whom a meat or meat products import licence is issued, benefit from a reduction in customs duties for the quantity for which the licence has been issued. If no import licence is obtained, economic operators may still import meat or meat products in any quantity, but they must pay full customs duties.
Source: OECD Business Licensing Inventory.
‘‘Silence is consent’’ is applied only for 2% of the licences included in the Inventory, meaning that it is explicitly provided by the applicable legislation. For 26% of the licences, information about the consequences of the absence of decision was not specified. This is problematic as it results in a high degree of uncertainty both for businesses and public administration.
Procedures tend to be cumbersome and rely little on digital application methods
The Inventory includes detailed information on the application methods and administrative steps to request each licence (Figure 2.4). For 71% of the licences the applicants need a minimum of two and a maximum of five administrative steps. For approximately 20% of the licences, the steps are more than five. These include 18 general licences, 24 licences in the commerce sector, 43 licences in the service sector and 6 industrial licences.
Distribution of licences according to the number of administrative steps
Source: OECD Business Licensing Inventory.
Although the EU Services Directive of 2006 and the EU Regulation 2018/1724 required the establishment of one-single point of contact for all administrative formalities, digital application systems for licensing procedures are only available for 51% of the licences (45% of licences can be requested through a website or platform and 6 % by email). For 45.4% of licences, there is no digital application method, while for 3.6% of licences the online application is under development (Figure 2.5).
Number of licences, per application method
Source: OECD Business Licensing Inventory.
The process of ensuring that pre-required licences and certifications are in place is burdensome
Applicants are often required to hold other licences and certificates which are considered essential pre-requisites to apply for some business authorisations. As shown in Figure 2.6, this is the case for 44% of the licences. Prior licences and certificates are necessary to ensure that the activities are carried out according to health and safety standards. In addition, professional qualifications such as diplomas and professional attestations are considered prior necessary licences to ensure that activities are performed by qualified operators. These prior necessary licences serve the important purpose of ensuring quality standards. The most common preliminary licences include the sanitation certificate, fire safety clearance, water management permit, and veterinary-sanitary authorisation.
Note: Registration in the National Trade Register is not counted as a prior necessary licence, as it is required for every licence and to carry out any type of activity, with a few exceptions. Professional qualifications and diplomas are considered prior necessary licences as they are necessary to request some business authorisations.
Source: OECD Business Licensing Inventory.
However, demonstrating compliance with the prior necessary licences requirements can make procedures for obtaining licences longer and more burdensome. Different institutions do not currently share data and information on the prior documents or licences required to apply for certain business operating licences, even in cases where the necessary prior authorisation is issued within the same competent authority. For instance, the Environmental Authorisation (ENV7) requires as a prior necessary licence the water management permit (ENV2), which is issued by another subordinated body of the Ministry of Environment, Waters and Forests. It is however left to the business to submit ENV2 to obtain ENV7.
There is also a limited use of self-declarations, that in some instances could also replace other forms of proof of compliance with prior licences and requirements. For instance, starting a driving school in Romania requires business operators to require the Driving School Authorisation (TRANSP21). Application for this authorisation is conditional on the prior obtainment of the vehicle approval certificate issued by the Romanian Automotive Register. Until an automatic exchange of data between institutions is established, the process could already be streamlined by allowing the economic operator to apply for the Driving School Authorisation by self-declaring that s/he has applied for and/or obtained the necessary approval certificate for the vehicle. Verifications could be made by the competent authorities.
In Romania, the majority of licences are issued by central authorities. However, local business licences, established by the Operating Act required under Government Order No. 99/2000, remain mandatory for certain activities. The process for obtaining these local licences is highly fragmented, as they are governed by rules established by municipal administrations. This results in significant variation across jurisdictions. For instance, some municipalities require prior authorisations from other authorities, whereas others do not. Such lack of harmonisation increases administrative burden and uncertainty for businesses, highlighting the need for greater consistency and simplification in local licensing practices (Romanian Competition Council, 2023[7]).
Legal deadlines tend to be long
The legal deadlines are the specific timeframes within which the licensing authority must respond to a business licensing application. The Inventory includes information on legal deadlines, as well as actual timelines, which track the average time needed to issue the licence. For the purpose of this analysis, legal deadlines were divided into 8 different categories, based on the number of maximum calendar days required to issue licences. As shown in Figure 2.7, legal deadlines vary across the different procedures with some expressed in working days and others in calendar days and sometimes involving unusual timeframes such as 28 days rather than standardised periods such as 30 calendar days. Nevertheless, around half of the licences included in the Inventory require 30 days to be issued. This is in line with art. 8 of Government Ordinance 27/2002, which has established the general rule for the public administration of a 30-day deadline to respond to requests (Portal Legislativ, 2002[8]).
Distribution of licences, based on the number of calendar days required to issue them
Note: In the cases where a range of days was indicated as deadline, the maximum number of days in the range was considered for the creation of the categories. Deadlines expressed in working days were converted to calendar days by adding two extra days every 5-day period. The “Other’’ category includes deadlines indicated as “Immediately after payment of the fee”, “Immediately after passing exam’’ or “The first day of the following month”.
Source: OECD Business Licensing Inventory.
The licensing authorities also provided information on the actual timelines for issuing the authorisations. Figure 2.8 shows that for 327 licences, effective deadlines are consistent with legal deadlines. In addition, for 108 licences (21.5%), competent authorities reported that actual processing times are shorter than the statutory deadlines. This discrepancy suggests that legal deadlines could be reassessed and adjusted to reflect the current administrative practices. Aligning legal deadlines with actual timelines to obtain business licences would contribute to reduce the expected average duration of licensing processes for businesses and entrepreneurs.
For approximately 7% of licences, actual processing times exceed the statutory deadlines. In order to accommodate for small errors or minor delays, delays below or equal to 20% of the number of days provided by the legal deadlines were excluded from the analysis. The results indicate that only two cases fall within this margin (20%), while the remaining 31 procedures exhibit delays exceeding 20%, ranging from 5 to 185 days. These delays occur not only for highly regulated sectors but also for non-highly regulated sectors. For example, the Environmental Authorisation (ENV7) is a general type of licensing procedure required for several activities. It has an actual deadline of 180 calendar days, compared to a legal deadline of 130 calendar days.
Distribution of licences, based on the difference between legal and actual timelines data
Note: In cases where one or both of these two pieces of information were not available, computations were not possible, and licences were counted in the “Not specified” category.
Source: OECD Business Licensing Inventory.
Limited coordination and sequencing of licensing application and processing
Licensing requests and applications are managed by each authority responsible for issuing licences. The exchange of information and documents across institutions is limited. Few institutions have protocols for information exchange. Consequently, entrepreneurs need to fill in forms multiple times, repeating the same information for different agencies. In addition, half of all licences included in the Inventory require submitting several paper copies of the same documents to various agencies.
When multiple licences are needed to conduct an activity, businesses typically have to submit their applications to individual agencies sequentially. However, what needs to be submitted first is not always clear, leading to confusion, delays and potentially missing appropriate checks on necessary requirements.
The assessment of the licensing system presented in the previous section provides a “bird-eye” view of the overall performance of the system and where major inefficiencies are. This systemic view is complemented by a more granular assessment of the bottlenecks for individual and group of licences to identify specific simplification measures. The OECD developed a methodology to assess the level of complexity of the licences. The complexity assessment is then further refined by an in-depth legal analysis of the requirements for a sub-set of commerce and service licences. This assessment builds the basis for identifying the simplification measures presented in Chapter 3. This section presents first the methodology for the assessment and then introduces the key findings.
Methodology
Complexity scoring
Licencing procedures have been grouped into three levels of complexity, from 1 (low complexity) to 3 (high complexity) according to criteria explained in Box 2.3 below. The complexity assessment covers 468 licensing procedures applicable to companies. It excludes 34 licences from the 502 licences included in the Business Licensing Inventory as these licences are required for activities carried out by natural persons and not-for-profit entities and therefore fall outside the scope of the analysis.
Sub-sector analysis
The sub-sector analysis focuses on activity-specific licences individually to assess whether requirements are justified and/or necessary for the specific licences or whether these requirements stem from outdated procedures and legacy decisions. The analysis helps identifying commonalities in documentation requirements or other key characteristics of licensing procedures, with a view to developing measures that could streamline processes and, ultimately, be extended to the entire business licensing system.
While procedures are never completely identical as each licence has its own specificities, certain documentation, steps or requirements might be similar and might offer the same potential for simplification. Overlapping documentation requirements and procedural similarities represent opportunities for streamlining. Therefore, the analysis of common requirements and procedural features across the different licences applicable to the selected sub-sectors is an important step in the process of streamlining licensing procedures.
The analysis covers 138 licences for non-highly regulated general and activity-specific licences applicable to the following ten sub-sectors:
1. Commerce (Wholesale and retail trade) (CAEN codes 4611-4792);
2. Transport and storage activities (CAEN codes 4911-5330);
3. Accommodation and food service activities (CAEN codes 5510-5640);
4. Publishing activities; radio and television broadcasting; content production and distribution activities (CAEN codes 5811-6039);
5. Administrative and support service activities (CAEN codes 7711-8299);
6. Education activities (CAEN codes 8510-8569);
7. Health and social work activities (CAEN codes 8610-8899);
8. Performing, cultural, sporting and recreation activities (CAEN codes 9011-9329);
9. Other service activities (CAEN codes 9411-9699);
10. General licences (Most common licences transversally applicable to different sub-sectors).
The licensing procedures are assessed through a scoring system based on 8 criteria which help determine the level of complexity of the licensing procedures. This methodology helps to navigate the information collected in the Business Licensing Inventory and identify bottlenecks that are then analysed in greater details. It is not meant to quantify burden nor the risk related to the activity that the licence is meant to authorise. The classification ranges from level 1 (low complexity) to level 3 (high complexity):
Level 1 (Low): Licences that score between 0 and 3 points are characterised by an overall low level of administrative and procedural complexity.
Level 2 (Medium): Licences that score between 4 and 6 points are characterised by an overall medium level of administrative and procedural complexity.
Level 3 (High): Licences that score 7 and 8 points are characterised by an overall high level of administrative and procedural complexity.
The criteria consider the features that contribute to making the process of obtaining a licence more cumbersome. All criteria have equal weight in the determination of the level of complexity. The scoring is based on a simple binary system, depending on the Yes/No answer to an assessment question for each of the eight criteria. If the answer is “Yes”, the licence scores 1 point, adding to the administrative complexity. If the answer is “No”, the licence scores 0 points. The points are then summed up to determine the level of complexity of the licence. The criteria and questions used in the assessment are:
1. Personal qualifications: Does the licence require personal qualifications, such as diplomas, professional licences or personal certificates?
2. Licence Fees: Are fees or taxes required?
3. Renewals: Is renewal required?
4. Application of ‘‘Silence is consent’’: Would inaction of authorities block the licensing process?
5. Application methods: Does the application process require in-person procedures?
6. Environmental safety: Are environmental checks required?
7. Public safety requirements: Are safety checks on equipment and premises required?
8. Public health, veterinary and/or sanitary requirements: Are health, veterinary and/or sanitary checks required?
Key findings
The results of the complexity level classification are shown in Figure 2.9. The low level of administrative complexity (Level 1) includes 175 licences (53 are highly regulated and 122 are non-highly regulated). The medium level of administrative complexity (Level 2) includes 283 (130 are highly regulated and 153 are non-highly regulated). The high administrative complexity (Level 3) includes 10 licences (1 is highly regulated, 9 are non-highly regulated). The split of complexity factors by level is provided in Table 2.1.
Distribution of licences, per level of administrative complexity
Source: OECD Business Licensing Inventory.
Source: OECD Business Licensing Inventory.
The evaluation indicates that a substantial number of licensing procedures require the payment of a fee. Fees are required in 81.6% of Level 2 licences (231 licences). They serve various purposes, primarily to cover the expenses incurred by the public administration to manage and issue licences. However, a notable discrepancy arises when comparing the number of licences requiring fees with those necessitating safety, health, veterinary or sanitary verifications. Safety checks are required in 66.3% of cases, while veterinary, health or sanitary checks are required in 20.2% of cases. In contrast, fees are required in 81.6% of cases. This disparity suggests that, in certain cases, the rationale for charging the fees is not clear or fully justified. Therefore, a thorough assessment of the fees is recommended to evaluate the necessity and justification for licensing fees. In addition, the lack of a unified online payment increases the administrative burden. Entrepreneurs are required to navigate multiple payment procedures, each governed by different institutions with distinct requirements, timelines, and platforms. A unified digital payment system would significantly improve user experience, reduce transaction costs, and support the broader digitalisation of licensing services.
As expected, the availability of an online application is relatively high for licences in Level 1 (66.5%) but it decreases for licences in Level 2 (44.2%). A factor determining this decrease in the availability of online application could be complexity of the documentation requirements which, in many cases, is higher for licences in Level 2. In addition, for some licences, the Romanian legislation requires authorities to verify the identity of the applicant, and the documents submitted in support of the application. This could in part explain why online application is not largely available for procedures in Level 2.
However, the percentage of licensing procedures with online application methods in Level 3 is higher than for licences in Level 2 (online application methods are available for 50% of licences in Level 3 and for 44.2 % of licences in Level 2). Therefore, while the complexity of the documentation could be a partial explanation of the unavailability of an online application, it cannot be considered the only factor determining the lack of online application systems. Another reason could be that the Romanian legal framework for licensing procedures often requires the applicants to bring all support documents in hard copy originals, even in cases where these are official documents issued by other public authorities. These practices vary across institutions, and they force applicants to submit notarised copies of the required documents or simple copies. In case of simple copies, the authorities are responsible to ensure that the copies and the originals match.
These procedural inefficiencies could be addressed. A key option could be the elimination of the requirement of presenting official documents previously issued by another state authority. Another viable solution could be to accept the use of electronic signatures. Although the current Law no.214/2024 on the use of electronic signatures provides that electronic signatures have to be accepted everywhere as valid signatures, they are not always accepted in practice (for instance, during some procedures in front of the fiscal authorities3).
The assessment reinforces the urgency of rethinking the implementation of “silence is consent”. The purpose of this provision is to allow applicants to overcome the obstacles imposed by the absence of decision of the authorities and obtain the necessary licence to operate a business, by alternative means. However, under the current legal framework, the only option available to the applicant in practice is to initiate a legal proceeding, aimed at obtaining a court order compelling the authority to issue the licence. In practice, this system requires the applicant to return to the same authority that caused delay, making the system inefficient. As a result, the mechanism does not constitute an effective means of supporting entrepreneurs in obtaining the licences required to conduct their business activities. Significant modifications to the law which regulates silent is consent rule should be adopted to make it effective
The data shows that renewals are necessary for over 36% of the licences in Level 1, for about 67% of licences in Level 2 and for all the Level 3 licences. Although renewal procedures can be considered necessary to ensure quality standards of the operations, requirements of periodical visas or rubber stamping could be eliminated. These mere procedural requirements do not fulfil any specific purpose for the protection of the public interest, yet they create burden for the holders of the licences and for the public administration. This could be solved by designing a general rule stipulating that all licences which do not have to be reassessed in order to be renewed are considered valid without any visa, rubber stamp or any other formality until they are revoked or expired. The Article V of the Government Ordinance 17/2015 already eliminated the practice of rubber stamping for all documents for natural and legal persons (Portal Legislativ, 2015[9])).
Moreover, the in-depth sub-sector analysis indicates that many of the identified obstacles (listed above) are not essential for maintain high licensing standards or safeguarding public safety. The analysis also contributed to identify effective levers such as the once-only principle to simplify and streamline the licensing procedures, thereby reducing these barriers and improving the overall functioning of the system.
References
[1] European Parliament and Council (2006), Regulation (EC) No 1893/2006 establishing the statistical classification of economic activities NACE Revision 2, https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/ALL/?uri=celex%3A32006R1893.
[6] High Court of Cassation (2013), Decision No. 13 of September 16, 2013, https://www.iccj.ro/2013/09/16/decizia-nr-13-din-16-septembrie-2013/ (accessed on 2025).
[11] OECD (2022), “Business licensing inventory and simplification roadmap. Enhancing the business environment in Romania through industrial and manufacturing licensing simplification”, https://www.oecd.org/content/dam/oecd/en/topics/policy-sub-issues/structural-reforms/country-tailored-policy-reforms/627685-business-licensing-inventory-and-simplification-roadmap.pdf.
[10] OECD (2022), “Comprehensive redesign of the licensing system in Romania. Enhancing the business environment in Romania through industrial and manufacturing licensing simplification.”, https://web-archive.oecd.org/pdfViewer?id=72408b7149222da7d66df147537c9f22cd27f7b5f10999f4bcdf6af75efc3b3e.
[3] OECD (2008), OECD Glossary of Statistical Terms, OECD Publishing, Paris, https://doi.org/10.1787/9789264055087-en.
[4] OECD/Eurostat (2014), Eurostat-OECD Methodological Guide for Developing Producer Price Indices for Services, https://doi.org/10.1787/9789264220676-en.
[9] Portal Legislativ (2015), Ordinance no. 17 of 15 July 2015, https://legislatie.just.ro/Public/DetaliiDocumentAfis/218179 (accessed on 2025).
[8] Portal Legislativ (2002), Ordinance no. 27 of 30 January 2002, https://legislatie.just.ro/Public/DetaliiDocument/33817 (accessed on 2025).
[7] Romanian Competition Council (2023), Final report of the study on the impact of the system of authorisation by local government authorities of the marketing of market products and services, on the market access of enterprises.
[2] Romanian National Institute of Statistics (2025), CAEN Rev. 3, https://insse.ro/cms/en/node/12088.
[5] United Nations (2008), International Standard Industrial Classification of All Economic Activities (ISIC), Rev4, https://unstats.un.org/unsd/classifications/Econ/Download/In%20Text/ISIC_Rev_4_publication_English.pdf.
← 1. This Inventory updates the inventory completed in 2022 in the framework of the project “Enhancing the business environment through industrial and manufacturing licensing simplification” (OECD, 2022[11]).
← 2. Simplification measures for the industrial sector had been identified through the project “Enhancing the business environment through industrial and manufacturing licensing simplification” (OECD, 2022[11]; OECD, 2022[10]).
← 3. For instance, when a company applies for a VAT code some fiscal authorities do not accept declarations on self-responsibility signed with e-signature; instead they require a hand-written paper document.