In the last decade Romania’s trade balance experienced substantial deficits. This external disequilibrium which affected the macroeconomic stability could be ameliorated by increasing the exports. Romania’s adhesion to the European Union in January 2007 created new opportunities for the exporters. However, in the new circumstances, the Romanian authorities are not allowed to apply the classical tools of the trade policy, such as subsidies or tax decrease, in order to stimulate the exports. Instead, assistance consisting in consultancy and facilities could be offered to the exporters for a better communication with foreign partners. Understanding the exporters’ motivation could be useful in such assistance. In this paper we approach the Romanian exporters’ perceptions about their activity. We use an investigation applied to the Romanian firms with export activity.Romanian exporters, Government assistance, Export performance

Dumitriu, Ramona

Nistor, Costel

Stefanescu, Razvan

English

Research Papers in Economics

MOTIVATIONS FOR THE ROMANIAN EXPORTERS 
 
 
Lecturer, Ramona DUMITRIU, Lecturer, Razvan STEFANESCU,  
and Assoc Prof, Costel NISTOR 
 
Faculty of Economics, University “Dunarea de Jos”, Galati, ROMANIA,  
rdumitriu@ugal.ro, rzvn_stefanescu@yahoo.com, costel_nistor_fse@yahoo.com 
 
 
Abstract: In the last decade Romania’s trade balance experienced substantial deficits. This external 
disequilibrium which affected the macroeconomic stability could be ameliorated by increasing the 
exports. Romania’s adhesion to the European Union in January 2007 created new opportunities for 
the exporters. However, in the new circumstances, the Romanian authorities are not allowed to apply 
the classical tools of the trade policy, such as subsidies or tax decrease, in order to stimulate the 
exports. Instead, assistance consisting in consultancy and facilities could be offered to the exporters 
for a better communication with foreign partners. Understanding the exporters’ motivation could be 
useful in such assistance. In this paper we approach the Romanian exporters’ perceptions about their 
activity. We use an investigation applied to the Romanian firms with export activity. 
       
 
Keywords: Romanian exporters, Government assistance, Export performance 
 
JEL Classification: F10, F19 
 
1. Introduction 
In  the  present  circumstances  the 
Government assistance for the exporters is 
an important part of the commercial policy 
of Romania. After the communist regime 
fall,  in  1989,  the  commercial  balance 
passed  from  surplus  to  considerable 
deficits.  In  January  2007  the  adhesion  to 
the  European  Union generated significant 
increases of the exports and of the imports. 
However, in comparison with the exports, 
the  imports  increased  with  a  bigger 
proportion, leading to disequilibrium of the 
foreign trade with not stainable levels. In 
the  absence  of  an  active  policy  this 
disequilibrium  could  endanger  the 
macroeconomic stability [1]. The adhesion 
to  the  European  Union  offered 
opportunities  to  enter  on  new  markets  to 
the  Romanian  companies.  Anyhow,  the 
possibilities of the Romanian Government 
to support the exporters by subsidies or by 
reductions  of  the  taxes  were  restrained 
considerably.  In  the  new  context  the 
Romanian  authorities  must  use  other 
instruments  to  support  the  exporters: 
consulting  services,  training  of  the 
employees,  facilitating  contacts  with 
foreign partners etc. 
In the use of these tools it must be taken 
into consideration the sequential nature of 
the  export  development  process  [2].  It  is 
recommended  that  for  every  level  of  the 
export  development  there  should  be 
applied  specific  forms  of  Government 
assistance [3].  
In  Romania  there  are  major  differences 
between  two  categories  of  exporters: 
foreign  direct  investment  (FDI)  and 
domestic  firms. In the export activity the 
foreign  affiliates  show  many  advantages. 
They benefit from significant resources and 
from  knowledge  and  connections  to  the 
foreign  markets.  Instead,  many  domestic 
firms have to deal with the lack resources 
and knowledge [4]. This situation could be 
related  with  the  fact  that  in  2009  about 
three  quarters  of  the  Romanian  exports 
were by FDI. 
The  actual  global  crisis  could  bring  a change  in  the  domestic  firms’  attitude 
towards  the  exports.  Since  the  second 
semester of 2010 the announced austerity 
measures  are  expected  to  cut  sharply  the 
demand. In these circumstances, for many 
Romanian  companies  the  solution  could 
consist  in  the  orientation  towards  the 
foreign  markets.  Some  empirical 
researches proved the decisions about the 
exports are significantly influenced by the 
managerial  perceptions  about  the  barriers 
and  the  advantages  regarding  the  foreign 
markets [5]. 
In  this  paper  we  study,  based  on  our 
investigation  among  36  administrators  of 
Romanian  companies,  the  managerial 
perceptions  about  the  exports  activity. 
Obviously,  this  sample  is  too  small  to 
allow a generalization for all the exporters 
from  Romania.  However,  the  results  of 
investigation  could  be  useful  in 
understanding  some  circumstances  of  the 
Romanian exporters’ activity.  
The  period  of  investigation  was  March  - 
April 2010. Exporters were questioned, by 
e-mail, about four subjects: 
- Main difficulties for the export activity; 
- Factors of the export performances; 
-  Effectiveness  of  the  government  export 
assistance programs; 
- Impact of the global crisis on the demand 
from the external markets. 
2.  The  main  difficulties  for  the  export 
activity  
The exporters’ answers regarding the main 
difficulties  for  the  export  activity  were 
heterogeneous.  Ten  of  them  considered 
that  national  currency  was  overvalued, 
especially in the months that followed the 
Romania’s  adhesion  to  the  European 
Union.  This evolution, combined with the 
increase  of  costs,  led  to  a  significant 
decline  of  the  external  competitiveness.  
Exporters  are  also  worried  by  the  lower 
predictability  of  the  exchange  rates  since 
they are not familiar with the techniques of 
the  foreign  exchange  rates  risk 
management. 
For  six  exporters  the  main  difficulty 
consists  in  the  decline  of  the  external 
demand  for  their  products  in  the  recent 
years.  The  global crisis  together with the 
increasing competition from the Asian and 
the  East  European  exporters  were 
considered as responsible for this situation.  
Other six exporters blamed the deficiencies 
of  the  actual  legislation  as  the  main 
difficulty  in  the  export  activity.  They 
accused especially the legislation regarding 
the customs and the VAT. 
The exporters mentioned other difficulties 
in  their  activity.  It  is  very  hard  for  the 
Romanian  firms  to  find  specialists 
qualified  in  the  international  business. 
Quite  often  the  quality  of  raw  materials 
from the domestic markets was inferior to 
those  from  abroad.  The  Romanian 
transporters  applied  high  prices  and 
sometimes  there  were  not  reliable.  Some 
exporters accused the lack of cooperation 
from  the  Romanian  embassies  personnel. 
Some  exporters  had  to  use  obsolete 
technologies  and  they  had  not  enough 
financial resources to access new ones.  
3. Factors of the export performances 
We asked the 36 exporters to characterize 
the  importance  they  perceived  for  four 
factors of the export performances: 
- Export strategies; 
- Firm reputation; 
-  Personal  relationships  with  foreign 
clients; 
- Government assistance. 
Exporters’  answers  revealed  that  most  of 
them  perceived  a  very  high  or  high 
importance  for  the  export  strategies,  the 
firm reputation and the personal relations 
with  the  foreign  clients.  Instead,  their 
perceptions  were  much  dispersed  in  the 
Government assistance case (Table 1). 
We transposed the exporters’ answers on a 
Lickert scale (1 point for “Very small”; 5 
points  for  “Very  high”).  Based  on  these 
numerical  values  we  determined  the 
descriptive statistics for each factor (Table 
2). 
The  results  indicated  significant  differences  between  the  Government assistance and the other three factors. 
4.  Effectiveness  of  the  government 
export assistance programs 
The  exporters  were  questioned  about  the 
degree  of  knowledge  regarding  the 
Governmental  assistance  programs.  It 
resulted that many of them considered they 
weren’t well informed.   
We asked the exporters to characterize the 
effectiveness  of  the  Governmental 
assistance  programs.  Their  answers 
revealed that more than two thirds of them 
appreciated  as  small  or  very  small  the 
utility  of  Governmental  programs  to 
support the exporters (Table 4).  
5.  Impact  of  the  global  crisis  on  the 
demand from external markets 
From the 36 exporters only one depended 
exclusively  on  the  foreign  markets.  The 
others were selling both on the foreign and 
the  domestic  markets.  We  asked  them  if 
the impact of the global crisis was different 
on the external markets in comparison with 
the domestic markets. For a single firm the 
demand  increased  both  on  the  domestic 
and  on  the  foreign  markets,  despite  the 
global crisis. The rest of 34 exporters were 
affected  by  the  decrease  of  demand  for 
both  the  international  and  the  domestic 
business.  For  18  of  them  the  external 
demand was reduced in a large proportion 
on the domestic markets while for the rest 
of 16 the demand on the foreign markets 
was affected higher. 
We  asked  the  exporters  about  their 
expectations regarding the demand on the 
external markets in the second semester of 
2010.  From  them,  19  anticipated 
stagnation,  14  expected  an  increase  and 
only 3 considered that the descendent trend 
would continue.  
 
6. Conclusions 
In this paper we approached, based on an 
investigation  among  36  firms,  the 
circumstances of the Romanian exporters’ 
activity. We identified some difficulties for 
the exporters that could be considered as 
barriers for the firms’ orientation towards 
the  foreign  markets.  By  the  Government 
efforts such barriers could be eliminated or, 
at  least,  attenuated.  For  example,  a 
controlled  devaluation  of  the  national 
currency  could  increase  the  external 
competitiveness of the Romanian firms and 
it  could  also  facilitate,  in  the  actual 
circumstances,  the  preservation  of  the 
exchange rates stability. Other Government 
efforts  should  be  directed  to  the 
improvement of the present legislation and 
to the Romanian embassies involvement in 
supporting the exporters. 
Among  the  four  factors  of  the  export 
performances  approached  in  our 
investigation,  the  Government  assistance 
programs  were  considered  as  the  least 
important.  More  than  a  half  of  the 
questioned exporters perceived a small or a 
very small utility for these programs. This 
situation was caused by the deficiencies in 
the implementation of these programs.  
Most of the exporters were affected by the 
decrease  of  the  demand  on  the  foreign 
markets.  However,  only  few  of  them 
expected  the  descendent  trend  would 
continue in the second semester of 2010. 
This  fact  could  be  considered  as  a 
motivation  for  the  orientation  to  the 
international business. 
 
References 
 
[1]  Dumitriu R. and Stefanescu R., Analysis of the Romanian Current Account Sustainability, 
Annals of the Faculty of Economics, University of Oradea, Faculty of Economics, vol. 
1(1), pages 163-168, May 2009. 
[2]  Johanson, J. and Vahlne, J., The Internationalization Process of the Firm – A Model  of 
Knowledge  Development  and  Increasing  Foreign  Market  Commitment,  Journal  of 
International Business Studies, 8, pp. 23-32, 1977. 
[3]  Moini, A. H., Small Firms Exporting: How Effective Are Government Export Assistance Programs?, Journal of Small Business Management, (January), pp.1-15, 1998. 
[4]    Markusen,  J.,  The  Boundaries  of  Multinational  Enterprises  and  the  Theory  of 
International Trade, Journal of Economic Perspectives, 9, 2, pp. 169-189, 1995. 
[5] Eriksson, K., Johanson J., Majkgard A., Deo Sharma D., Experiential knowledge and cost 
in  the  internationalization  process,  Journal  of  International  Business  Studies,  second 
quarter, pp. 337 – 360, 1997 
 
Appendix 
 
Table 1 Exporters’ perceptions about the importance of four factors of export performances 
       
  Factor 
 
Degree of 
importance 
 
Export 
strategies 
 
Firm reputation 
Personal 
relationships 
with foreign 
clients 
 
Government 
assistance 
 
Very high  21  19  18  7 
High  9  13  13  7 
Medium  5  3  5  10 
Small  1  1  -  7 
Very small  -  -  -  5 
Total  36  36  36  36 
 
Table 2 Descriptive statistics on the exporters’ answers regarding the importance of four factors of 
the export performances 
 
           Factor 
 
Degree of 
importance 
 
Export 
strategies 
 
Firm 
reputation 
Personal 
relationships 
with foreign 
clients 
 
Government 
assistance 
 
Sum  158  158  157  112 
Mean  4.389  4.389  4.361  3.111 
Median  5  5  5  3 
Standard Deviation  0.838  0.766  0.723  1.326 
Coefficient of 
variation 
 
-1.172 
 
-1.217 
 
-0.682 
 
-0.059 
Confidence Level 
(95.0%) 
 
0.283 
 
0.259 
 
0.245 
 
0.449 
 
Table 3 Exporters’ degree of knowledge regarding the Governmental assistance programs 
Degree of 
knowledge 
Very 
high 
High  Medium  Small  Very 
small 
Total 
Number of 
answers 
 
3 
 
10 
 
9 
 
8 
 
6 
 
36 
 
Table 4 Exporters’ perceptions about utility of Governmental assistance programs 
Level of utility  Very 
high 
High  Medium  Small  Very small  Total 
Number of 
answers 
 
- 
 
1 
 
10 
 
12 
 
13 
 
36 
 

Analysis of the Romanian Current Account Sustainability,

Experiential knowledge and cost in the internationalization process,

Small Firms Exporting: How Effective Are Government Export Assistance Programs?,

The Boundaries of Multinational Enterprises and the Theory of International Trade,

The Internationalization Process of the Firm – A Model of Knowledge Development and Increasing Foreign Market Commitment,

Motivations for the Romanian exporters

Motivations for the Romanian exporters

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