Foreign Seasonal Workers in Tourism: the List of Activities Doubles, From 7 to 14, and Wellness Comes In

Hotels and guesthouses may now bring in seasonal workers from outside the European Union for twice as many types of activity as before. The Government adopted Decision No. 608/2026, which establishes the list of sectors comprising activities that depend on the succession of the seasons and repeals the old list, from 2017. The list matters for one thing only, but an important one: it delimits exactly the activities in which an employer in Romania may take on a foreign national as a seasonal worker. For anyone looking for staff, it should be read together with the list of shortage occupations for which foreign workers may be recruited.

The decision has only two articles and an annex. Article 1 establishes the list, specifying that it applies exclusively for the implementation of the provisions on the employment of foreign nationals as seasonal workers. Article 2 repeals Government Decision No. 187/2017, published in Official Gazette of Romania No. 232 of 5 April 2017. The act transposes Article 2 paragraph (2) of Directive 2014/36/EU on the conditions of entry and stay of third-country nationals as seasonal workers.

The annex has two sectors and 33 positions: 19 under agriculture and 14 under accommodation, food service and leisure activities in tourism. Each position has a name and a CAEN class, so eligibility is not decided by how the activity sounds, but by the code in the company’s registration certificate.

What it changes in practice

The first effect is the practical one: the scope widens on the tourism side. The old list had seven positions there. The new list has fourteen, exactly double.

The second effect is that food service enters as a whole. Until now, only restaurants and bars were covered out of the food service area. Event catering now enters as well, CAEN class 5621, together with other food service activities, class 5622. The old restaurants class, 5610, has meanwhile been split in two, and the list takes over both of them: 5611 for restaurants and 5612 for mobile food service units.

The third effect is the least obvious from reading the title: two classes from the health area appear. Traditional, complementary and alternative medicine activities, class 8686, and other human health activities not elsewhere classified, class 8699, are placed in the tourism sector. In practice, this is the wellness, spa and balneotherapy area of hotels, meaning precisely the part that works with the season.

The fourth effect concerns leisure proper. Renting and leasing of recreational goods and sports equipment enters the list, class 7721, meaning the centres that hire out skis, bicycles or boats, together with the activities of theme and amusement parks, class 9321. The general position at 9329, other recreational and amusement activities, also stays on the list.

The fifth effect is that agriculture does not change at all. The 19 classes, from growing cereals to seed processing, are the same as in 2017, in the same order and with the same names. Anyone already working with seasonal staff in vegetable growing or in vineyards has nothing new to read.

The sixth effect is one of legal basis. The old decision rested on Article 11 paragraph (3) of Government Ordinance No. 25/2014 on the employment and posting of foreign nationals. The new decision rests on Article 27² paragraph (8) of Government Emergency Ordinance No. 194/2002 on the status of foreign nationals in Romania, and Article 1 points to the same act for the rules on taking on seasonal workers.

What has changed compared with the previous situation

The simplest way to see the difference is to place the two annexes side by side. In agriculture, the 19 positions match one by one: 0111, 0112, 0113, 0115, 0116, 0119, 0121, 0124, 0125, 0126, 0127, 0128, 0129, 0130, 0150, 0161, 0162, 0163 and 0164.

In tourism, the 2017 list had seven positions: hotels and other similar accommodation facilities, holiday and other short-stay accommodation, camping grounds, recreational vehicle parks and trailer parks, other accommodation services, restaurants, bars and other beverage serving activities, and other recreational and amusement activities. Accommodation, with its four classes, has remained identical.

The rest has changed. Restaurants used to be listed under class 5610 and now appear under 5611, following the renumbering in the current classification of activities. Seven codes appear alongside them that were not on the old list: 5612, 5621, 5622, 7721, 8686, 8699 and 9321.

Of these, only six actually widen the scope. The seventh, 5612, also comes from the renumbering: the old class 5610 was called „Restaurants” on the list, but it covered mobile food service units as well, and the current classification has split it into 5611 and 5612.

The addition of catering, by contrast, is a real widening. A distinct class for event catering existed in the old classification too, but it had not been placed on the 2017 list. Now it is.

The form of the act has changed too. The 2017 decision had a single article and seven countersignatures, from the interior, labour, agriculture, tourism, the business environment, foreign affairs and European affairs. The 2026 one has two articles and three countersignatures, two of them given by state secretaries, on behalf of the minister.

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