What is your assessment of Spain, not so much as an ambassador, but as a person?

I’ve been in Spain on many occasions, be it formal events or leisure and I was always amazed by the beauty of Spain, its fantastic architecture, culture and, of course, cuisine. During this three months, I am residing here, my admiration has only increased. I should also underline the hospitality and openness of people that is extraordinary. On weekends I am trying to go outside Madrid and visit villages. It is unbelievable, how much you can discover there. I already visited Santander and had official meetings there. I am planning to visit other regions of Spain both for official encounters, but also to discover their rich traditions. My husband is Georgian and most probably you have heard the stories he tells me about the links between Georgian and Basque people. I am looking forward to visit Vitoria-Gasteiz and other cities of the region in the near future.

The report of the ICEX  issued in 2016 which  quote, in turn, the Cost of Doing Business report – developed by the International Finance Corporation - notes that the legal insecurity, corruption and excessive bureaucracy are discouraging investment; however, during this year there has been a small increase of imports and exports. Will the Ambassador work with the Chambers of Commerce and other Spanish institutions to maintain this trend?
 

Our Government is conducting profound reforms in all sectors that are important to improve the lives of our citizens. With the entry into force of the EU/Moldova Association Agreement and the DCFTA, we have undertook concrete additional commitments that are being implemented and in accordance with the EU assessment, the Republic of Moldova steady remains the leader in the Eastern Partnership initiative. We are grateful to the support rendered by the EU in effectively conducting these reforms that aim to ensure further political and economic development of my country. As for you question, obviously, one of important tasks of our diplomatic service concerns economic diplomacy and I am working with the chambers of commerce, both in Madrid and in the regions of Spain to further support business relations between our states. For the next year, we are planning to organize important events that would bring together economic agents from both countries and allow them to discuss, plan and agree concrete business projects and transactions. I see large room for further increase of bilateral economic relations between the Republic of Moldova and the Kingdom of Spain and I have quite optimistic expectations in this regard.

Union-Fenosa is one of the most important investors in Moldova. Spain has a great prestige in the field of energy and infrastructure and Moldova is one of the neuralgic points of international trade routes. Do you have confidence that the Spanish companies will increase their investments in your country?

As I already mentioned, we are working in various directions. Tourism, construction, pharmacopeia, along with energy and transport are among the domains, together with other segments, where I see our co-operation has very good prospects for further development.  My short-term objective in this context is to ensure that the Spanish companies and entrepreneurs, including small and medium-size business agents have more information about the possibilities my country could offer. To this end, as I have already mentioned, we have concrete action plan for activities to be conducted already next year, both in Spain and in Moldova.

The Spanish tourism represents the 1'2% of visitors traveling to Moldova. Do you think that it would be interesting to stimulate the growth of this percentage?  What measures has your government articulated to achieve it?

When it comes to tourism, I can say that at the moment there is a direct connection between Chisinau and Madrid, Barcelona and Valencia. This direct flights operated by the two Moldovan companies – AirMoldova and Flyone at the moment are covering the existing demand. However, every year there is an increase in the number of Moldovans visiting Spain and vice versa. However, I would like to continue your idea and tell you that we are working to increase number of Spanish tourists visiting my country. The touristic infrastructure is constantly developing in Moldova and during last few years a number of new hotels of different levels have been introduced in Chisinau. There is a high demand on rural tourism and there are too, there are concrete plans and projects that need to be fulfilled in order to make our regions more desirable and accessible for foreign, but also domestic visitors.

The recurring russian vetoes to the Moldovan products, especially against the wine, have been a serious blow, but, it has also provided an opportunity to reorient exports into new markets. What could Moldovan wine offer to the Spanish consumer?

Wine is not only our business product, but like in Spain, it is an intrinsic part of our national identity, history and culture. Although initially Russian embargo on wine had quite difficult consequences for our companies, it also created an opportunity for the wine-makers. Namely, our companies were obliged to search for diversified markets and look for other places where the Moldovan wine would be appreciated. Logically, even more attention was paid to the improvement of the quality of the produced wine, so to make it more competitive with the wine produced in other winemaking countries in Europe and beyond. This gave its results and today, our wine is exported in China, USA and many European states. As far as I know from people involved in this domain in Moldova, European giant wine-making states like Spain, France, Italy and Portugal are not in the list of main target markets for Moldovan producers when it comes to quantities. However, I think that in these traditional wine countries, the diversity is even more appreciated by the consumers and small focused deliveries of quality wines have very good business prospects. In December, the Embassy shall participate at the Christmas Market organized by the Municipality of Madrid and we have already arranged that Moldovan companies shall present their wines, so we can offer to Spanish consumers more information about our best product. I hope this will be the first step and in the near future, Moldovan wines could be found on the shelves of Spanish specialized shops. The same is true when it comes to Spanish wine in Moldova, as since my arrival the Embassy already received some proposals from the Spanish companies and we have facilitated their contacts with our companies working with the importation of foreign alcohol products in Moldova.

Recently, the President of Ukraine signed a new Education Law in his country that regulated the teaching of Romanian in that country. Do you think that the Romanian language could disappear from the Slavic country as a consequence of that law?

Ukraine is our strategic partner and we have excellent relations with our neighbor both on bilateral level, but also within the multilateral formats such as the Council of Europe, OSCE, GUAM, BSCE etc. We are also partners in the Eastern Partnership and currently conducting a number of very important political and other joint projects mutually beneficial for both nations. Ukraine has concrete legal obligations stemming from its membership in different international organisations and international legal instruments. Ukraine is party to European Convenion for the Protection of National Minorities, as well as of the European Charter of Regional and Minority Languages. I believe Ukraine shall live up with its international commitments.

Almost immediately after submitting your credentials to His Majesty, Philip VI, you addressed the citizens to offer the support of the Embassy to any initiative that might be interesting for the diaspora and for Moldavia.  Have you received many proposals?

Indeed, a number of my compatriots are legally residing in Spain. They have diaspora organisations established and registered and mainly through these structures, they are keeping their ties with Moldova. One of the tasks of the Embassy is to support their activities and obviously, more efficiently this task could be realized not by imposing some projects on them, but jointly elaborating and identifying most important and relevant actions. To this end we have launched the initiative, which was very well accepted by the members of our diaspora. Frankly speaking and considering the number of organisation established by native Moldovans in Spain, I was expecting to receive much more proposal and ideas. However, this is the continuing process and the proposal/projects I have received up to know forms a good bases for concrete actions for the next few months.  Actually, all the files received were coming from Spanish citizens of Moldovan origin and most of them relate to organisation of cultural and education activities, so to ensure on one hand that ethnic Moldovans can have access to our cultural heritage and on the other hand, children and teens who where either born or raised in Spain have the possibility to learn their language and history. As a result, we have already launched the Sunday School for Children. At the moment Embassy premises are used for this purpose, but since we expect the number of participants and also of classes to grow eventually, I had very productive meeting in the office of Madrid Mayor, whom I want to thank for the kind offer of support. In recent month, Embassy either co-organized or supported the cultural events where our compatriots could either attend the theater in Romanian language or listed to our national folk and pop music.

What could the diaspora do to bring Moldova closer to the Spanish population?

As I already mentioned, one of the tasks for the Embassy is to support our diaspora within the limits of our resources and possibilities. I believe that together with the diplomatic representations, diasporas are to be considered as the face of the nation and much depends on them for the delivering our messages to the Spanish society and people. In Moldova, we have special structure under the PM of the Republic, Bureau for Relations of Diaspora. Together with my colleagues from the MFA IE and the Bureau we shall continue active co-ordination with the representatives of our Diaspora in Spain and I hope with their engagement we shall better achieve our common objectives.

I suppose that you trust that bilateral economic and cultural relations will be increased during your stay in Spain.. Could you indicate which is the project that most motivates you at this time?

I would not at this stage single out any particular project that is pending or is under implementation. My main tasks with my team in the Embassy, as well with friends and partners in Spain is to further support the strengthening of our already strong political, economic and cultural ties between Moldova and Spain. Apart of fields I mentioned above, we are working on the promotion of bilateral agreements as well on promotion of bilateral ties between the sectorial ministries and governmental structures, as I believe Spain has experience and know-how that could be very much useful for Chisinau to consider and take into account while we are proceeding with our reform agenda. I am more than persuaded that we have good opportunities for mutually beneficial closer co-operation and partnership with the Kingdom of Spain.