OREANDA-NEWS. June 30, 2014. The country office of the German International Cooperation Agency (GIZ) was inaugurated in Chisinau today. The event was held within an official visit to Moldova by a German delegation, to conduct inter-governmental consultations.

Attending the event, German Minister for Economic Cooperation and Development Gerd Muller highlighted that GIZ was an agency acting on behalf of the German Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development, other federal ministries, international institutions and organisations. “This is a mechanism implementing development programmes and projects on the improvement of services in various sectors, such as: engineering infrastructure, drinking water supply, waste water treatment, construction and endowment of hospitals, providing assistance in the education area, schools and universities,” Muller said.

Regional Development and Construction Minister Marcel Raducan specified that the opening of the GIZ office in Moldova was a very important event for the country. “The presence of the German minister shows Germany’s willingness to cooperate with Moldova at a higher level and is a clear-cut message for our state that the new cooperation phase will be extremely important and fruitful,” Raducan said.

German Ambassador to Moldova Mathias Meyer said the opening of the agency’s future headquarters was an eloquent proof of intentions of long-term collaboration as regards the development cooperation. “A GIZ distinctive sign is that the projects it implements are not dictated from the leadership, but an essential contribution is to be brought by people for the regional development,” Meyer said.

The German International Cooperation Agency was set up in 1975, and its cooperation with the Moldovan government started in 1994.