Office Writer

Most of what I do at the embassy involves preparing for various trade missions. When they are actually going on there is very little for me to do. Last week and yesterday, I helped with the prep-work for a trade mission to Moldova, and a trade fair in Paris. This mainly consists of making more spread sheets, business cards, and schedules. Today, half of the office is out, including the Boss, and Monica Erimia, the person who gives me most of my work. They are attending these events and there is very little for me to do. Yesterday, I copy-edited one of my colleague’s speeches, a report on the Romanian water industry. It was a spoken factual report, and I was in my element. The person I edited it for was amazed with the clarity and quality of the revised version. I edited a success report today, and the same person was floored. Through the editing process I learned a lot about the Romanian water industry. Apparently the industry is made up almost completely of privatized regional providers. There is only one provider that is a government–private partnership. However, the main stakeholder in the private utility firms is local government. There is currently a large push to modernize and expand water distribution and treatment felicities, in order to meet EU standards. As such, it is an attractive sector for American business. American companies must partner with a local firms to be competitive, as experience in Romanian markets is a large part of the bid evaluation process.The fact that the local government is the main owner of the regional utility companies can lead to some interesting gray areas. The water treatment firm in Constanta recently bought a helicopter, as it has many plants spread out over a distance. There was some disagreement in the media as to whether this represented a necessary corporate purchase, or local government officials using the profits to buy themselves a new toy.