It is happening with the social vouchers, from tomorrow, in Romania: who receives the new meal vouchers

Although they have been announced for several weeks, and their subject has been disseminated in a hundred ways, one day before the actual deliveries start, government officials have clarified the “technical elements of the grant”. The latter are more important than you think.

The campaign for granting social vouchers in Romania will start tomorrow, June 1, and the latest features around them have been clarified by an emergency ordinance. These are the technical elements regarding the implementation of the granting measures. These were made public by Government spokesman Dan Cărbunaru.

What about social vouchers, since when?

From June 1, the Ministry of European Investment and Projects will start issuing and distributing over 2.5 million social vouchers. This is “an approach that will support important categories of Romanians, vulnerable citizens, to get through this period marked by multiple crises in better conditions.”

If the whole concept is foreign to you, it is worth bearing in mind that vulnerable Romanians are defined as people who have earned less than 1500 lei per month, a value very close to the minimum wage in the economy. The vouchers will be sent through the Romanian Post, in the form of vouchers visually similar to a credit card. They can be used exclusively for grocery shopping or hot meals, hence the parallel with meal vouchers. If you use them for something else or choose to exchange them for money, you risk very hefty fines. A social voucher in the form of a card has a value of 250 lei and will be issued every two months, until the end of this year.

“Today’s emergency ordinance regulates a series of technical elements to facilitate the implementation of this project, part of the” Support for Romania “package,” Cărbunaru said at a news conference at Victoria Palace in the end of yesterday. As a reference, the measure regarding the granting of social vouchers was approved by GEO 63/2022.