Romania has a high agricultural potential that allows ensuring food safety and security. However, the performances achieved by this sector are still low compared to other member states of the European Union. The low average productions, both in the case of vegetable production and especially in the case of livestock production, highlight the dependence of our country's agricultural sector on the climate factor, with direct influences on the trade balance of agri-food products. Increasing the competitiveness of the agri-food sector can be achieved through two pillars, namely improving the quality of agri-food products, as well as obtaining and bringing to the market agri-food products at affordable prices for domestic and foreign consumers. The work represents a detailed analysis of the performances achieved by the Romanian agri-food sector, compared to other states of the European Union, highlighting the existing gaps, as well as the comparative advantages of our country determined by the high agricultural potential. Also, the paper presents an analysis of the trade balance of agri-food products in order to determine the impact of the performances achieved in agriculture on the balance of the trade balance. The conclusions of the analysis demonstrate the need to secure funds for making investments in modern technology for the agri-food sector, both from non-reimbursable European funds and from national funds. Also, from our analyzes it follows that there is a need to identify financial mechanisms to encourage investors in this sector, such as subsidizing interest on loans, providing guarantees for loans, granting tax facilities for agricultural producers, etc.