THE TOURISM INDUSTRY IN ROMANIA DURING THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC

The COVID-19 pandemic has had a dramatic and unprecedented impact on the tourism sector, drastically reducing tourism flows and, therefore, the revenues of businesses in this sector. International, regional and local travel restrictions immediately affected national economies, including tourism systems, international travel, domestic tourism, air transport, public transport, accommodation, restaurants, festivals, sports events etc. Beyond the immediate shock, the tourism sector faces other, longer-term challenges, related to its green and digital transformation, its competitiveness, its sustainability and its resilience (according to ECA, Special Report 27 p.4) The paper presents an analysis of tourism in Romania during the 2019-2021 period, based on the analysis of the main indicators and the presentation of the solutions proposed by the European Union to recover the tourism sector. The multiannual financial framework for the 2021-2027 period comprises a number of 14 programs designed to finance actions in the tourism sector and the Recovery and Resilience Mechanism (RRM) provides Member States with the opportunity to finance investments and reforms, including in the tourism sector. Romania’s National Recovery and Resilience Plan approved by the Commission in September 2021 focuses, in particular, on digitizing services, increasing responsiveness and ensuring institutional resilience at national level. Furthermore, through the S.O.S. Romanian Tourism, the Alliance for Tourism (APT) presents us with two important objectives: helping tourism out of the critical state in which it currently is and resetting the entire hospitality industry, as well as the measures taken to achieve the proposed objectives.