The campaign to put up a tourism brand for Romania saw a 2 million euro budget approved on Wednesday by the Government. Other 9 million euro will be spent on promoting Romania in Spain and Italy, also using state funds. At least four attempts to create such a brand took place in the past few years, proving each time to be completely worthless.

Tourism Ministry state secretary Lucia Morariu claims that Romania has 75 million euro allocated for promoting tourism projects, within the Regional Operational Program, but the state has to pay for the projects first, then the discount from EU funds can be made. According to Morariu, the new branding initiative has nothing to do with the previous attempts: "In case the brand we create is successful, this will also influence the country brand".

The campaigns will focus on Italy and Spain because this is where Romania faces most image problems.

The latest branding attempt was the famous "Fabulospirit" affair, paid for by the Foreign Ministry. The slogan itself was paid for 100,000 euro and the campaign should have cost 5 millions. The project was ceased after the resignation of the Foreign Minister at the time, Mihai Razvan Ungureanu.

"The Eternal and fascinating Romania" project cost 6 million euro, while the "Romania - always surprising" was another 1.7 million dollars. Another project in 2007, Romania - Simply Surprising, was cancelled because it didn't communicate the essence of Romania for any potential visitor. The campaign to put up a tourism brand for Romania saw a 2 million euro budget approved on Wednesday by the Government. Other 9 million euro will be spent on promoting Romania in Spain and Italy, also using state funds. At least four attempts to create such a brand took place in the past few years, proving each time to be completely worthless.

Tourism Ministry