3. FAGARAS
• It is the second city of Brasov
county as size (about 28,000
inhabitants) and it has an altitude
between 424-441 meters
• It lies on the National Highway DN1
between Brasov City (66 kilometers)
and Sibiu City (76 kilometers).
4. A small town
• Like any other small towns in
Romania, Fagaras is caught in
between the development of new
economic centers and the shutting
down of gigantic communist era
factories, struggling to find a new
life.
5. A Historical Small Town
• Once a commercial and political
center of the Feudalist Europe
Fagaras was the home of Doamna
Stanca, wife of Mihai Viteazul, the
man responsible for the first
unification of the three Romanian
Principates into roughly what is now
Romania.
6. Lots of Big Changes
• Fagaras faces the closure of the majority of the operations
of a Chemical products manufacturer that directly or
indirectly employed the majority of the people in the
surrounding areas.
• The chemical industry, as many others in Romania, was part
of the centralized plan of the Ceausescu’s communist
regime. And as many others, after the so called revolution,
it was shut down.
• The sudden change of regime, and complete lack of planning
and leadership, left these functioning industrial monsters
paralized.
7. Labour Force:
Decline in recent years
• At the end of 2007 there were only 7000 employees in
Fagaras, a lot less than in the Communist regime.
• The 35% of the employees work in industry (chemical
products, plastic products, car and equipment industry,
textile industry, food industry).
• The remainder of the employees work in fields as trade,
education, health, welfare, constructions, transport,
energetic sector, banking, insurance, public administration.
• Under 2% of employees work in agriculture and other
activity fields.
8. Looking for Better Places
• With no work, many inhabitants left, looking for a better future.
Many left early on to bigger cities close by, Sibiu and Brasov.
• The young and hungry for new opportunities, have left to western
Europe, mainly Italy and Spain.
• On a sunny day in August, the streets are flooded with brand new
Peugeot, Alfa Romeo, Volkswagen, and a black Mercedes Benz or
Audi here and there. They bring successful stories with them.
• A surprisingly big minority though, has left for America. It seems
like a ‘glitch’ on the visa lottery has favored hundreds of
fagarasenii.
9. Transylvania
and the Romanian peasants
• Yes its true: the Romanians love their
country and they have fought for their
land as other nations.
• The tremendous thing from behind the
history of the land, the peasant’s love for
their land is described with no
resemblance by the Romanian writer Liviu
Rebreanu in the novel “ION” or George
Cosbuc in his poem “NOI VREM PAMANT”
(WE DEMAND LAND).
10. Social and economic crisis
• But many Romanians, as any of other
nations, have dared and searched for
new lands or a better living in a NEW
WORLD, perhaps as a result of a
desire for knowledge, but also, as
clear as that, is the fact that it was
mainly an economic phenomenon.
11. Immigration
• More than 11,000 Romanians from
Transylania who immigrated to America
at the beginning of the 20th
century were
hard workers in search of better
opportunities.
http://studiiromanoamericane.wordpress.
12. Immigration to Italy
• About 1 million Romanians live in Italy nowadays.
The migrants coming back sometimes show off
but the underlying factor is that these people
have left to work, and they have been successful.
• However since the 1989 revolution we have had
lots of problems with children whose parents work
abroad and the authorities have tried to apply a
methodology for providing support through after
school centers
• http://www.childrenleftbehind.eu
13.
14. Strong criticism from the UK
and other European Union member
states
• They criticize the Romanians for their tendency
to flee their own country, fearing that they are
going to create problems by taking their jobs and
occupying their living spaces.
• However, they neglect the fact that these people
are hungry for work, and are not leaving their
country willingly. They are forced out due to lack
of opportunities.
15. Hardships
• The Făgăraş zone of problematic but
mixed agro-industrial economy, has
long contributed labor to the
international economy through the
migration of its citizens.
http://epa.oszk.hu
16. Migrants from Fagaras
• They are not going into other countries to joyfully work in
the fields, factories, or as janitors and servers.
• Many of these people are well educated and would gladly
stay in their own country if they could make a good living as
engineers or managers.
• They are looking for a better future, and if they cannot
find it, they will make one for themselves. It is
unacceptable that the large European economies blame
these hardworking individuals for their own social problems.
http://alejandrogiacometti.com/2006/11/fagaras/
17. A Dead Town?
• With an ageing population, and an
ever-shrinking economy, Fagaras,
once a commercial and political
center of the Feudalist Europe once
a symbol of the Romanian unity,
might soon be forgotten.
18. There’s still a solution
• In spite of all economic and social
problems Fagaras we think we must
and can do something to save our
little town but this cannot be done
without the help of our leaders.
