RESEARCH ON ROMANIA'S EMPLOYMENT IN AGRICULTURE AND ITS POSITION IN THE EUROPEAN UNION

The paper analyzed Romania's employment in agriculture, forestry and fishery in the period 2007-2012 using the empirical provided by the National Institute of Statistics and Eurostat and the specific methods for such a study: statistical parameters, fixed index method, and comparison method. In 2012, in Romania's agriculture were employed 2,682 thousand persons, representing 64.07 % of the employed rural population and 28.95 % of the employment in the economy, the highest level in the EU where the average accounted for 4.7 %. Of the employed persons in Romania's agriculture, 53.5 % were sole holders, 45 % family members and 1.5 % non family regular workers. Also, 53.1 % were men. Romania came on the last position in the EU-27 for the people employed full time in agriculture (0.9%) and on the penultimate position for 83 % employed persons in small holdings SO<Euro 4,000. Aging is another feature as of the total employed persons in agriculture, 38.8% were between 15-30 years old, 47.2 % were between 40-64 years old and 13.9 % were of 65 and over. Romania's agriculture is dominated by family farms, the most people being part-time employed in farm work, agricultural works are achieved in small farms, the employed population is aging, the most of the young people is not attracted by agriculture looking for better paid jobs in the cities or abroad. To improve the situation, it is needed the diversification of the activities in the rural areas to create new jobs and increase income, to stimulate the young people and women to work in the rural areas by developing services and industry, preserving traditions, folklore, local gastronomy, handicrafts. The Horizon 2014-2020 Programme is destined to strengthen labour force and agriculture performance by offering funding for knowledge transfer, technical and managerial skills development for young, small farmers and women and for agribusiness encouragement.