Hungary has traditionally been richer and more economically advanced than Romania, but a recent article in the Hungarian media points out how EU funds to Bucharest have increased dramatically in recent months while Hungary has seen funds from Brussels dry up.
“Something has changed: (European Commission president) Ursula von der Leyen and her team are making Romania great, billions of euros have been transferred to them – what has happened is unprecedented. In the last six months, the flow of European Union funds into the Romanian economy has accelerated spectacularly,” vg.hu reported.
The good news for Romania stands in contrast to the picture in Hungary. The EU has significantly cut and frozen billions in funds for Budapest over rule-of-law concerns. Hungary permanently lost over €1 billion in cohesion funds that expired at the end of 2024 for failing to implement required anti-corruption and judicial reforms.
The European Commission has withheld a total of €18 billion, linking access to EU money to upholding democratic standards, a move the illiberal Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, in office since 2010, calls politically motivated. The country holds parliamentary elections in April and a fomer Orban ally Peter Magyar is ahead in the polls.
The Hungarian outlet published the article after Romanian Minister for Investments and European Projects “Dragoș Pâslaru posted on Facebook that EU funds have reached the Romanian economy five times faster than before, while Bucharest has managed to claw back years of delay over the non-implementation of EU requirements.
“In the last six months, the absorption of cohesion funds has accelerated at an unprecedented pace: based on payment applications submitted to the European Commission, the absorption rate has increased from 9.9% to 20.4%, which means, in fact, a doubling of use,” vg.hu reported on Wednesday.
Pîslaru said that a total of 2.9 billion euros were cashed in by Romania in previous years, while 2.3 billion euros entered the state treasury in six months.
Between 2021 and mid-2025, Romania received an average of 86 million euros per month, in the last six months this amount exceeded 450 million euros, while the monthly rate of repayments increased almost sevenfold, the minister wrote in his post.
Pîslaru stressed that the last six months represent only a tenth of the entire 2021-2027 budget period, but 37% of all payments and 43% of repayments from the European Commission were made in this half year.
The EU funds play a key role in reducing the budget deficit which was 9,3% in 2024. The goal for 2026 is to inject over 5 billion euros from cohesion funds into the Romanian economy, while preparations for the period 2028-2034 are already underway, he said.
In 2026, the ministry wants to withdraw ten billion euros from EU recovery funds and spend at least 15 billion euros of that on investments in health, education, transport infrastructure and economic competitiveness, the Hungarian publication noted.
The Hungarian press also noted that not everything was better. Gas prices in Romania, higher than in Hungary, have risen as part of an austerity package implemented by Prime Minister Ilie Bolojan cabinet on August 1 to cut Romania’s ballooning budget deficit.
Hungary has a GDP of $223 billion compared to $383 billion for Romania, according to Georank. Salaries are higher in Hungary but its capital, Budapest, is 20% more expensive than Bucharest, according to one site.
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