On Tuesday, April 8th, 2003, Alexandrina Hîrtan, vice-president of the National Regulatory Authority for Communications (ANRC), took part in the 5th Accession Workshop, on the topic: “The application of the new Regulatory Framework in the Accession Countries: the new telecommunications package and competition law”, by the European Telecommunications Network Operators’ Association (ETNO). ETNO was founded in 1992 and its primary purpose is to establish a constructive dialogue between its member companies and decision-makers involved in the development of the European Information Society. The Workshop in Bucharest, hosted by the Romanian fixed telephony operator, focused on the necessities of the telecommunications market in the candidate countries to the European Union, with respect to the regulations on communications and market competition. The workshop was attended by regulation experts and legal experts of the telecommunications companies, members of ETNO, both from the European Union states, and from the candidate countries.
The ANRC vice-president talked about the changes existent on the Romanian communications market brought about by the application of the new European Directives in the sector and by the liberalization, pointing out the role and achievements of the National Regulatory Authority for Communications. In her presentation, Alexandrina Hîrtan referred to the current situation of the Romanian market in comparison to other candidate countries, as well as from the point of view of the new companies competing RomTelecom after January 1st, 2003.
Romania is the first of the candidate countries adopting the new European regulatory framework as national legislation in the sector of electronic communications. The implementation of the new legislation coincided with the complete opening of the electronic communications market, whose configuration is currently completely changed. „The establishment of a National Regulatory Authority for Communications was necessary in order to prepare the opening of the market and to ensure the development of real competition after the liberalization. In 2001 Romania decided to adopt the new European regulatory framework for communications in order to sustain the transition from monopoly to competition in a moment when the European Union decided to change the former legislation in order to adapt it to a dynamic market, taking into consideration the convergence process, present in the communications sector, and with the intention to make available deregulation instruments for the regulatory authorities from the member and candidate countries. The new regulatory framework is better adapted to the complexity of the Romanian communications market as it offers the same means to approach the non-competitive markets as the former framework, under the conditions that the regulatory instruments are fully used”, showed Alexandrina Hîrtan.
Alexandrina Hîrtan underlined the fact that Romania succeeded in a short period of time to regulate the interconnection tariffs for the fixed and mobile operators, the national fixed operator publishing the reference interconnection offer under the conditions set out by ANRC only a month after the Authority had established the principles and preconditions.
In order to complete the image of the institution’s activity, the ANRC vice-president shortly presented the Authority’s action directions for 2003. These include, among others, the continuation of the electronic communications wholesale markets regulation, measures for the retail markets regulation (the markets of the services provided to final users), programmes for Universal Service implementation, as well as a number of actions designed to correctly inform the consumers on the rights and opportunities the electronic communications market offers. Also, the website www.anrc.ro shall be developed in order to sustain more applications, such as the official record of electronic communications networks and services providers and postal services providers, consumer guides or on line questionnaires for market analyses.
Alexandrina Hîrtan briefly presented for the representatives of the regulatory authorities from the candidate countries present at the reunion the manner in which the Universal Service shall be provided in Romania, by identifying those disadvantaged areas from the point of view of the access to electronic communications services and by designating universal service providers through competitive methods.
The representatives of the European Commission present at the seminar presented in detail the Commission’s vision on how the new European regulatory framework for electronic communications should be implemented in the candidate countries, as well as the essential regulatory principles for stimulating the competition according to the new acquis.
The ANRC Vicepresident’s presentation on this seminary is available on the Internet page of ANRC.