Donald W. Bernier

Romania, located in southeastern Europe and usually referred to as one of the Balkan states, shares land borders with Bulgaria, Yugoslavia, Hungary, and the Soviet Union and has a shoreline on the Black Sea (see fig. 1). The interior of the country is a broad plateau almost surrounded by mountains, which, in turn, are surrounded, except in the north, by plains. The mountains are not unduly rugged, and their gentle slopes plus the rolling interior plateau and the arc of lowlands on the country's periphery provide an unusually large percentage of arable land.

Romanian historians have remarked that their country's history might have been different had its mountains been located on its borders rather than in the interior. Romania's mountains provided a refuge for indigenous populations but did not constitute barriers against invaders who sought to dominate the area or use it as a crossroad for deeper invasions of the Balkan region (see ch. 2).

The prevailing weather is eastern European continental, with hot, clear summers and cold winters. Rainfall is adequate in all sections, and in normal seasons the greater share falls during the summer months when it is of most benefit to vegetation and crops. Soils on the average are fertile. Forests occupy about 27 percent of the land surface.

All of the major streams drain eventually into the Danube River and to the Black Sea. The entire length of the Danube in or bordering the country is navigable. There are few canals, and the Prut River is the only other waterway that is navigable for any considerable distance. Several of the rivers originating in the Carpathians have a good potential for hydroelectric power but, because oil and natural gas are abundant, their development has not had high priority.

In 1971 railroads carried by far the greatest volume of long-distance freight and passenger traffic, but highway transport was supplanting them in short-haul traffic of both types. Commercial aviation had multiplied its capacities since 1950 but still carried only a minute percentage of total traffic. Pipelines were the principal carriers of liquid petroleum and natural gas. The merchant marine had developed relatively rapidly after 1960 and, although still small, consisted almost entirely of modern ships and equipment.

The population, estimated at more than 20.6 million in 1971, was growing at the second highest rate in Europe. The country's officials, however, did not expect the 1971 rate to be maintained throughout the remainder of the century.

The standard of living was among the lowest in Europe. Living conditions improved markedly after 1950, but emphasis on heavy capital investment held down production of consumer goods. The land has been more than self-sufficient in the agricultural sector, but food products have been exported in quantities that have made some of them scarce locally.

NATURAL FEATURES AND RESOURCES

Topographical and Regional Description

All of the mountains and uplands of the country are part of the Carpathian system. The Carpathian Mountains originate in Czechoslovakia, enter Romania in the north from the Soviet Union, and proceed to curl around the country in a semicircle (see fig. 3). The ranges in the east are referred to as the Moldavian Carpathians; the slightly higher southern ranges are called the Transylvanian Alps; and the more scattered but generally lower ranges in the west are known as the Bihor Massif. A few peaks in the Moldavian Carpathians rise to nearly 7,500 feet, and several in the Transylvanian Alps reach 8,000 feet, but only a few points in the Bihor Massif approach 6,000 feet.

Lowland areas are generally on the periphery of the country—east, south, and west of the mountains. A plateau, higher than the other lowlands but having elevations averaging only about 1,200 feet, occupies an area enclosed by the Carpathian ranges.

Moldavia, in the northeast, constitutes about one-fourth of the country's area. It contains the easternmost ranges of the Carpathians and, between the Siretul and Prut rivers, an area of lower hills and plains. The Moldavian Carpathians have maximum elevations of about 7,500 feet and are the most extensively forested part of the country. The western portion of the mountains contains a range of volcanic origin—the longest of its type in Europe—that is famous for its some 2,000 mineral water springs. Small sections of the hilly country to the northeast also have forests, but most of the lower lands are rolling country, which becomes increasingly flatter in the south. Almost all of the nonforested portions are cultivated.

Figure 3. Topography of Romania.

Walachia, in the south, contains the southern part of the Transylvanian Alps—called the Southern Carpathians by Romanian geographers—and the lowlands that extend between them and the Danube River. West to east it extends from the Iron Gate to Dobruja, which is east of the Danube in the area where the river flows northward for about 100 miles before it again turns to the east for its final passage to the sea. Walachia is divided by the Olt River into Oltenia (Lesser Walachia) in the west and Muntenia (Greater Walachia), of which Bucharest is the approximate center, in the east. Nearly all of the Walachian lowlands, except for the marshes along the Danube River, and the seriously eroded foothills of the mountains are cultivated. Grain, sugar beets, and potatoes are grown in all parts of the flatland; the area around Bucharest produces much of the country's garden vegetables; and southern exposures along the mountains are ideally suited for orchards and vineyards.

The Transylvanian Alps have the highest peaks and the steepest slopes in the country; the highest point, with an elevation of about 8,340 feet above sea level, is 100 miles northwest of Bucharest. Among the alpine features of the range are glacial lakes, upland meadows and pastures, and bare rock along the higher ridges. Portions of the mountains are predominantly limestone with characteristic phenomena, such as caves, waterfalls, and underground streams.

Transylvania, the northwestern one-third of the country, includes the historic Transylvanian province and the portions of Maramures, Crisana, and Banat that became part of Romania after World War I. The last three borderland areas are occasionally identified individually.

Nearly all of the lowlands in the west and northwest and the plateau in the central part of the province are cultivated. The western mountain regions are not as rugged as those to the south and east, and average elevations run considerably lower. Many of the intermediate slopes are put to use as pasture or meadowland but, because the climate is colder, there are fewer orchards and vineyards in Transylvania than on the southern sides of the ranges in Walachia. Forests usually have more of the broadleaf deciduous tree varieties than is typical of the higher mountains, but much of the original forest cover has been removed from the gentler Transylvanian slopes.

Dobruja provides Romania's access to the Black Sea. The Danube River forms the region's western border, and its northern side is determined by the northernmost of the three main channels in the Danube delta. The line in the south at which the region has been divided between Romania and Bulgaria is artificial and has been changed several times.

For nearly 500 years preceding 1878, Dobruja was under Turkish rule. When the Turks were forced to relinquish their control, the largest elements of its population were Romanian and Bulgarian, and it was divided between the two countries. Romania received the larger, but more sparsely populated, northern portion. Between the two world wars Romania held the entire area, but in 1940 Bulgaria regained the southern portion. The 1940 boundaries were reconfirmed after World War II, and since then the Romanian portion has had an area of approximately 6,000 square miles; Bulgaria's has been approximately one-half as large.

Dobruja contains most of the Danube River delta marshland, much of which is not easily exploited for agricultural purposes, although some of the reeds and natural vegetation have limited commercial value. The delta is a natural wildlife preserve, particularly for waterfowl and is large enough so that many species can be protected.

Fishing contributes to the local economy, and 90 percent of the country's catch is taken from the lower Danube and its delta, from Dobruja's lakes, or off the coast. Willows flourish in parts of the delta, and there are a few deciduous forests in the north-central section. To the west and south, the elevations are higher. The land drains satisfactorily and, although the rainfall average is the lowest in the country, it is adequate for dependable grain crops and vineyards.

Along the southern one-half of the coastline there are pleasant beaches. In summer the dry sunny weather and low humidity make them attractive tourist resorts.

Bukovina, more isolated than other parts of the country, has a part-Romanian and part-Ukrainian population. Romanian Bukovina is small, totaling only about 3,400 square miles. It was part of Moldavia from the fourteenth century until annexed by Austria in 1775. Romania acquired it from Austria-Hungary in 1918, but after World War II the Soviet Union annexed the 2,100-square-mile northern portion with its largely Ukrainian population.

The approximately 1,300 square miles of the former province remaining in Romania is picturesque and mountainous. Less than one-third is arable, but domestic animals are kept on hillside pastures and meadows. Steeper slopes are forested.

Drainage

All of Romania's rivers and streams drain to the Black Sea. Except for the minor streams that rise on the eastern slopes of the hills near the sea and flow directly into it, all join the Danube River. Those flowing southward and southeastward from the Transylvanian Alps drain to the Danube directly. Those flowing northward and eastward from Moldavia and Bukovina reach the Danube by way of the Prut River. Most of the Transylvanian streams draining to the north and west flow to the Tisza River, which joins the Danube in Yugoslavia, north of Belgrade.

Romanian tourist literature states that the country has 2,500 lakes, but most are small, and lakes occupy only about 1 percent of the surface area. The largest lakes are along the Danube River and the Black Sea coast. Some of those along the coast are open to the sea and contain salt sea water. These and a few of the fresh water lakes are commercially important for their fish. The many smaller ones scattered throughout the mountains are usually glacial in origin and add much to the beauty of the resort areas.

The Danube drains a basin of 315,000 square miles that extends eastward from the Black Forest in the Federal Republic of Germany (West Germany) and includes a portion of the southwestern Soviet Union. It is about 1,775 miles long, including the 900 miles in or adjacent to Romania, and is fed by more than 300 tributaries, from which it collects an average of about 285,000 cubic feet per minute to discharge into the Black Sea. Much of the Danube delta and a band of up to twenty miles wide along most of the length of the river from the delta to the so-called Iron Gate—where it has cut a deep gorge through the mountains along the Yugoslav border—is marshland.

For descriptive purposes the river is customarily divided into three sections; most of the portion in Romania—from the Iron Gate to the Black Sea—is its lower course. The northern bank of this course, on the Romanian side, is low, flat marshland and, as it approaches its delta, it divides into a number of channels. It also forms several lakes, some of them quite large. At its delta it divides into three major and several minor branches. The delta has an area of about 1,000 square miles and grows steadily as the river deposits some 2 billion cubic feet of sediment into the sea annually.

Climate

The climate is continental and is characterized by hot summers and cold winters. Typical weather and precipitation result from the high pressure systems that predominate over European Soviet Union and north-central Asia. Southern Europe's Mediterranean weather and western European maritime systems occasionally extend into the area but not frequently, and they prevail only for short periods. Winters are long, and the months from November through March tend to be cold and cloudy, with frequent fog and snow. Although summers may be hot, they are sunny, and the humidity is usually at comfortable levels.

Precipitation ranges from fifteen to fifty inches; the countrywide average is about twenty-eight inches. Dobruja, along the lower Danube River and adjacent to the Black Sea coast, averages the least, followed by the lowlands of Moldavia and southernmost Walachia, which usually receive less than twenty inches. The remaining lowlands of the country and the Transylvanian plateau average between about twenty and thirty-two inches. Bucharest receives about twenty-three inches. In all of the agricultural regions the heaviest precipitation, most of it from thunderstorms and showers, occurs during the summer growing season when it is of maximum benefit to crops and vegetation.

Scattered areas in the Transylvanian Alps and in the other mountains of the northern and western parts of the country receive more than fifty inches annually. Foothills on all exposures also get more than the country average. Western exposures benefit from the generally eastward movement of weather systems; southern and eastern slopes benefit from the clockwise circulation around the high-pressure systems that are characteristic of the continental climate.

January is the coldest month; July, the warmest. Bucharest, located inland on the southern lowland, is one of the warmest points in summer and has one of the widest variations between average temperatures of the extreme hot and cold months. Its average January temperature is about 27° F, and in July it is 73° F. Summer averages are about the same at other places in the eastern lowlands and along the Black Sea, but the moderating effect of winds off the sea makes for slightly warmer winters in those areas. Hilly and mountainous sections of the country are cooler but have less variation between winter and summer extremes.

Nowhere in the country is the climate the deciding factor on the distribution of population. There are no points where summer temperatures are oppressively high or winter temperatures are intolerably low. Rainfall is adequate in all regions and, in the lower Danube River area where it might be considered the most nearly marginal, marshes and poorly drained terrain are more of a problem than is lack of rainfall.

Soils

The most fertile soils of the country occur generally on the plains of Moldavia and parts of Walachia. This is the black earth known as chernozem, which is rich in humus. Most of the black earth and some of the brown forest soils also have a high loess content, which tends to make them light, fine, and workable. These rich varieties also occur on the lowlands of the west and northwest and on the Transylvanian plateau. Lighter brown soils are more prevalent in rolling lands and in foothills throughout the country.

Soils become progressively poorer at higher elevations and as the slopes become steeper. Layered soils, which take over as elevations increase, vary widely and tend to become thinner and poorer at higher elevations until bare rock is exposed. In some lower areas, where there are areas of brown forest soils, erosion is a serious problem. Although the sandy and alluvial soils along the Danube River are of excellent quality and are valuable where drainage is good, those in a fairly wide belt along the river are too moist for cultivation of most crops.

Vegetation

Before the land was cleared, lowland Romania was a wooded steppe area, but the natural vegetation has largely been removed and replaced by cultivated crops. Forests still predominate on the highlands. Of the country's total area, about 63 percent is agricultural land; 27 percent is forest; and 10 percent is bare mountain or water surface or is used in some way that makes it unsuitable for forest or cultivation. Of the agricultural land, 65 percent is under cultivation, 30 percent is pasture and meadow, and 5 percent is orchard and vineyard (see ch. 15).

Forests remain on most of the slopes that are too steep for easy cultivation. Most of the larger forests are in Transylvania and western Moldavia in a roughly doughnut-shaped area that surrounds the Transylvanian plateau. Broadleaf deciduous and mixed forests occur at lower elevations; forests at higher levels are coniferous with needle-leaf evergreens. There are alpine sheep pastures at 5,000- and 6,000-foot elevations, and tundra vegetation occurs at some of the highest locations.

Orchards are found in all sections of the country. Peaches can be grown in Walachia, but only those fruits that can tolerate colder winters are raised in Moldavia and Transylvania. Vineyards, especially on the Walachian mountain slopes, have become more important since World War II, and wine, although it is not of a quality that receives international acclaim, is exported.

Natural Resources

The most important natural resources are the expanses of rich arable land, the rivers, and the forests. The land is agriculturally self-sufficient and, when fertilizers become more readily available, crop yields will be appreciably larger. The rivers have a high potential for the generation of hydroelectric power. Most of them rise in the mountains and fall to the plains quite rapidly and could be profitably harnessed. Rainfall distribution is good throughout the year and would provide more than an ordinarily dependable source of waterpower. The potential was only beginning to be tapped in 1971 (see ch. 15).

Large fields of oil and natural gas are the most important sub-surface assets. Both are of the best quality in Europe, with the possible exception of those near Baku in the Soviet Union. Liquid petroleum is pumped from large fields in the Ploiesti area and also from an area in central Moldavia. Natural gas is available under a large part of the Transylvanian plateau.

A few minerals, such as lead, zinc, sulfur, and salt, are available in quantities needed domestically, but iron and coal are not plentiful. Deposits of lignite, gold, and several other minerals occur in concentrations having sufficient value to be mined.

BOUNDARIES AND POLITICAL SUBDIVISIONS

Boundaries

When it gained full independence in 1878, Romania contained the historic provinces of Moldavia and Walachia, some of Bessarabia, and a portion of Dobruja. Substantial numbers of Romanians remained outside the original state's boundaries in Transylvania and in the Russian portion of Bessarabia. The first boundaries remained little changed until after World War I, although the strip of Dobruja was enlarged somewhat in 1913, after the Second Balkan War (see ch. 2).

In the 1918 settlement after World War I about 38,500 square miles were ceded to Romania from the dismantled Austro-Hungarian Empire. In addition to historic Transylvania, with its area of about 21,300 square miles, a strip along its western side, with a substantially Magyar population, and Bukovina, part of which is now the most north-central section of the country, were included. Also in the aftermath of World War I and the Russian revolution, Romania acquired Bessarabia from the new Bolshevik regime and enlarged its holdings in Dobruja at Bulgaria's expense.

During the brief period of accord between the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany immediately before World War II, portions of Romania were sliced away and divided among Hungary, Bulgaria, and the Soviet Union. The post-World War II settlement, arrived at in 1947, again transferred Transylvania from Hungary to Romania, and Dobruja—with a somewhat modified southern border—was transferred from Bulgaria. The Soviet Union retained all of Bessarabia and the northern portion of Bukovina. In 1971 none of Romania's borders were disputed, and all of them were satisfactorily demarcated.

The total circumference of the country is about 1,975 miles. The northern and eastern border with the Soviet Union extends for about 830 miles; the southern border with Bulgaria, for 375 miles; the southwestern border with Yugoslavia, for 345 miles; and the northwestern border with Hungary, for 275 miles. The Black Sea coast is about 150 miles long. The eastern boundary generally follows the Prut River, and most of the southern boundary is formed by the Danube; in the west and north the border follows no distinctive terrain features, often having been drawn according to ethnic, rather than geographic, considerations.

Political Subdivisions

Until 1968 the communist regime had divided the country into seventeen regions—including one consisting of the Bucharest metropolitan area only—and 152 districts. In an extensive reorganization of local governments at that time, the regions were done away with and replaced by the prewar system of counties (judete). In 1971 there were thirty-nine counties, plus Bucharest and its suburban areas, which were still administered separately. Bucharest was one of forty-six municipalities, but it was the only one not subordinate to the district in which it was located. Each county is named for the town that is its administrative center. The newer organization has served to increase public participation in local government but has also increased the authority of the central government.

Bucharest, with a population of nearly 1.5 million in 1969, was about six times larger than Brasov, the next largest city. The Bucharest district was smallest in area and greatest in population. Other districts had roughly similar areas and populations. They averaged about 2,350 square miles in area and, although their populations varied between fewer than 200,000 and about 750,000, two-thirds of them had between 350,000 and 650,000 persons.

The 1968 reorganization also made extensive changes in the lower portion of the local administrative structure, reducing the number of communes by about 40 percent and villages by nearly 15 percent. Typical counties had about fifty communes of about 4,000 to 5,000 persons each. The smaller local units were created, dissolved, or combined as population and local requirements changed but, as of January 1970, there were 236 towns, 2,706 communes, and 13,149 villages. Of the towns, the forty-seven most important were classified as municipalities, and the communes included 145 that were suburban areas of the larger towns (see ch. 8).

POPULATION

The area approximating that defined by the 1971 boundaries of the country had a population estimated at about 8.2 million in 1860. Thirty years later it had increased to about 10 million. Growth began to accelerate slightly after 1890, with periods of greatest increases between 1930 and 1941 and between 1948 and 1956, until it reached an estimated 20.6 million in 1971.

The 1971 estimate was derived from the 1966 census and projected from vital statistics compiled locally through 1970. On this basis the estimated annual rate of growth was 1.3 percent, exceeded in Europe only by that of Albania. Density of the population was 224 persons per square mile. Projected at the 1971 growth rate, the population in 1985 would be 23.3 million, and it would take fifty-four years for the population of the country to double.

The 1971 growth rate, however, may not be maintained. Legislation enacted in 1966 stringently restricted abortions and discouraged birth control practices, resulting in an increased birth rate for the next few years, but by 1971 there were indications that the rate was again declining. Unofficially, it is expected that the population will reach only 25.75 million by the year 2000, or about 27 percent more than in 1970. The projection is based on a growth rate of less than that of the 1970-71 period. It is expected to average about 1.1 percent for the 1971-75 five-year period and to decrease thereafter, resulting in an average of between 0.7 and 0.8 percent over the entire period. Moreover, the increase is expected to be far greater in the over-sixty age group and to provide only about 14 percent more workers in the productive age brackets between fifteen and fifty-nine.

In 1970 the birth rate, at 23.3 births per 1,000 of the population, was also exceeded only by Albania's in all of Europe. The rate of infant mortality, at 54.9 deaths during the first year of life for each 1,000 live births, was slightly lower than those of Yugoslavia and Portugal and was exceeded significantly only by that of Albania. The death rate, at 10.1 per 1,000 was very close to the overall European rate of ten per 1,000.

According to the 1971 official estimate there were 10.1 million males and 10.4 million females, or 102.8 females for every 100 males in the population. Males outnumber females slightly in the childhood years and are the majority sex in each five-year segment of the population to about the age of thirty. Females outnumber males in the thirty to thirty-four age group, after which there is near numerical equality between ages thirty-five and forty-four. Females attain a clear majority beyond age forty-five. Female life expectancy, at 70.5 years, is approximately four years greater than that of males.

The population group with ages from fifty to fifty-four had both a low overall figure and an abnormally low percentage of males (see table 1). The low total reflected a low birth rate during World War I years; the abnormal sex distribution reflected World War II combat losses. The low total in the twenty-five to twenty-nine group resulted from the low birth rate during World War II, and the low figure for the five-to-nine age group reflected the fewer number of parents in the group twenty years its senior and their disinclination to have children because of low incomes and inadequate housing.

The size of the five-to-nine age group was of concern to the country's economists because it will provide a smaller than desirable augmentation to the labor force at the end of the 1970 decade and for the early 1980s. The seemingly much larger group that was under five years of age in 1971, on the other hand, would appear on the surface to more than compensate for the smaller one preceding it. The country's economists, however, did not believe that an alleviation of the chronic shortage of people in the most productive working ages would occur during the twentieth century.

Table 1. Romania, Population Structure, by Age and Sex, 1971 Estimate (in thousands)

Aside from natural growth and additions and subtractions of territories and their occupants, the country's population has been comparatively stable. It has been affected to a lesser degree than others in eastern Europe by migrations during and after World War II, probably losing between 300,000 and 400,000 persons in various resettlement and population exchange movements. The largest emigration involved Jews to Israel. Israeli data show an average of about 30,000 immigrants from Romania during the three immediate postwar years, and Jewish people accounted for a major share of all emigration between then and the late 1960s.

Within the country the greatest shift of people has been from rural to urban areas. The rural population grew by about 0.5 million, from 11.9 million to 12.4 million, between 1945 and 1971. During the same period urban population increased by about 3.5 million, from 4.7 million to about 8.24 million, and has become about 40 percent of the total. Officials anticipate that the rural population will stabilize and that most future increases will be to the towns and cities.

Of the 60 percent of the people who still live in small villages and settlements, most depend upon agriculture for their livelihood. Isolated farms and dwellings prevail in the more remote hills and mountains, and life in those areas has been little affected by industrialization of the country or by the collectivization of agricultural land, which has been accomplished in most of the better farming areas.

Older villages most typically have individual family houses, with farm buildings adjacent and with considerable separation between houses. In areas that have been collectivized there has been some effort to remove buildings from productive land and to nucleate the villages.

Population is most dense in the central portion of Walachia, centering on, and west of, Bucharest and Ploiesti and along the Siretul River in Moldavia. Southwestern Walachia and central and northwestern Transylvania are also more densely settled than the average for the country. The area around Dobruja, lands of high elevation, and marshlands along the lower Danube River are the most sparsely settled areas.

LIVING CONDITIONS

According to semiofficial Romanian sources, the national income increased by six times during the twenty-year period between 1950 and 1970, and real wages, by 2.7 times. Between 1966 and 1970 improved economic conditions and a broader based industry had created about 800,000 new jobs, most of them in the industrial sector.

Increases in national income have been accompanied by increased outlays for social and cultural programs. The 1970 allocations for such programs were ten times greater than in 1950 and amounted to 27.5 percent of the total national budget.Housing, production of consumer items, and changes in food consumption had also improved. Between 1966 and 1970 about 345,000 state-funded apartments and about 315,000 privately built dwellings became available. New facilities for production of automobiles, furniture, wearing apparel, television sets, and other domestic electrical appliances increased output in these areas by about seven times that of 1950. Foods with high nutritive value were consumed in larger quantities. Consumption of milk, garden vegetables, fruit, eggs, and fish nearly doubled between 1966 and 1970. More meat and cheese were also eaten, but the increase in their consumption was less spectacular.

Efforts on behalf of public health were reflected in increasing the life expectancy from forty-two years in 1932 to a figure that was more than 60 percent greater in 1970. Additional and better equipped hospitals and other medical facilities contributed to this, as did more emphasis on public sanitation and increased numbers of doctors and medical assistants. In 1970 there was a ratio of one physician for every 700 inhabitants, which was near the overall European average.

Despite an impressive record of achievements in the production of industrial goods, the standard of living—with the exception of Albania's and Portugal's—was probably the lowest in Europe in 1971. During the preceding twenty years production of consumer goods was held down, while heavy capital investment was encouraged. This was deliberate economic practice calculated to be of maximum benefit to the country in time but not intended to produce the greatest immediate results.

The rent for an ordinary three-room apartment in 1971 was about one-third of the average worker's monthly wages; the cost of a new automobile was about forty times his monthly income. Housing area was small, the countrywide average being about eighty-two square feet of living space per person. Although about 140,000 urban apartment units became available in 1969 and similar numbers were programmed for succeeding years, the housing situation was worse in cities than in small towns and rural areas.

Commentary on the lot of the consumer varies widely, frequently to the point of direct contradiction. Visitors that have had a less than totally favorable impression of the country report that food items—even the common staples, such as eggs, cheese, and sausage—are not always available and that, when they are, purchasers wait in long lines. Because food items are often available only in small shops individually specializing in milk, cheese and sausage, or vegetables and eggs, for example, the mere task of buying food is a time-consuming undertaking. Persons disenchanted with the situation also complain that, although poor harvests in 1968 and 1969 and floods in 1970 contributed further to food shortages, much was still exported during those years. In 1971 the government reiterated its plans to devote primary attention to the development of its heavy industrial base. Plans at that time, they alleged, would discourage increased production of consumer goods through 1975 at the least.

TRANSPORTATION

Railroads

Romania's early rail lines were developed largely in relation to external points rather than to serve local needs. Until World War I the one major trunk line ran south and east of the Carpathians from western Walachia to northern Moldavia. Feeder lines and branches connected to it, but there was little early construction in the marshy areas near the Danube River, and only one bridge, at Cernavoda, crossed it. Transylvania, not yet part of the country, was linked to the old provinces by only one line across the Carpathians. Total route mileage was about 2,200 miles.

Hungary had developed lines connecting Budapest with Transylvania and branch lines within that province. When the area was annexed in 1918, Romania inherited the existing railroads and set about linking them more advantageously with the rest of the country. Most of the modern system was completed by 1938, but route mileage was increased by about another 10 percent after World War II. Late construction included another bridge over the Danube River, this time at Giurgiu, south of Bucharest (see fig. 4).

The system probably attained its maximum mileage in 1967, when it totaled almost 6,900 route-miles, all but about 400 of them standard gauge. About ten miles of line were retired during 1968 and 1969, and other little-used feeder lines will probably be abandoned as it becomes more practical to carry small loads over short distances by truck.

Railroads transported nearly ten times as much freight in 1969, measured in ton-miles, as did the highways. Their average load was carried a greater distance, however, and motor transport actually handled a larger volume of cargo (see table 2). During 1969 the railroads also carried over 300 million passengers, for an average trip distance of thirty-two miles.

The Romanian State Railroads, directed by the Ministry of Transportation, operates all but a few minor lines and, in 1969, had about 147,000 employees. As steam locomotives are retired, they are being replaced by diesels. Only a little more than 100 route-miles have been electrified. Officials expect that roads and motor vehicles will take increasing percentages of short-haul cargo and short-trip passenger traffic. Airlines may cut somewhat into the long-distance passenger traffic, but the railroads are expected to remain important for both their freight and passenger services.

Table 2. Use of Transportation Facilities in Romania, 1950, 1960, and 1969

Roads

Of the 47,800 miles of road, in 1969 about 6,000 miles—or 14 percent—were considered modernized. A little more than one-third had gravel or crushed stone to harden them, and almost exactly one-half had unimproved dirt surfaces.

About 7,600 miles were nationally maintained and included the greater portion—5,200 miles—of those in the modernized, improved category. Only about 1,400 miles of the local roads were modernized, and less than one-half of them had hardened surfaces. According to government planning reports, the road network is considered adequate in size, and all that can be allocated to it will be applied to its modernization. Motor transport was nearly negligible until after World War II, but between 1950 and 1969 it assumed importance that rivaled the railroads in both cargo and passenger traffic.

Waterways

Nearly 1,500 miles of the rivers are considered navigable. All of the Danube—over 900 miles—that is within or along the southern border of the country is navigable and, in fact, connects the Black Sea and Romania with all points upstream—through Yugoslavia, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, and Austria to Ulm in West Germany. The Prut, flowing along much of the eastern border with the Soviet Union, accounts for most of the remaining navigable mileage. Other streams are useful in some degree for timber rafting and for floating agricultural products downstream. Rapid currents in hilly sections, silting and meandering streambeds in the lowlands, and fog and ice in winter months, however, limit the commercial usefulness of the rivers. Ice stops traffic on the Danube River for an average of more than one month per year and on the other streams from two to three months.

The country's topography does not lend itself to the development of an extensive system of canals. There are short canals in the western lowlands. Two of them connect to the Tisza River in Yugoslavia but, as with this pair, further development of the waterways in this portion of the country would be economically advantageous only when they connected to points in Hungary or Yugoslavia. Most of the northern and central regions are hilly or mountainous.

Cargo shipped on rivers and canals in 1969 was less than 1 percent of that carried by the other transport systems, but most of it was transported for relatively long distances along the Danube River. Passengers carried constituted an even more minute percentage of the total and, because the largest numbers of them rode river ferries, the relative passenger mileage percentage was even lower.

Airlines

Commercial aviation is altogether state owned and is operated by an office in the Department of Automotive, Maritime, and Air Transportation that, with the Department of Railroads, is part of the Ministry of Transportation. Romanian Air Transport—always referred to in common and in most official usage as TAROM, derived from Transporturi Aeriene Romane—serves a dozen or more cities in the country and contacts about twenty national capitals outside the country. These include Moscow, all of the capitals of the Warsaw Treaty Organization (Warsaw Pact) member nations, and about a dozen capitals in Western Europe and the Middle East. Service to nearly all of the external points consists of no more than one round trip flight weekly to each. Domestic service has expanded steadily since 1950 but varies throughout the year to provide more frequent trips during the holiday and tourist seasons.

The line carries some cargo but an insignificant amount when compared with other modes of transportation. It has, however, begun to carry a more significant number of passengers. This traffic increased from less than 40,000 in 1950 to about 780,000 in 1969. Each year since 1965 it has carried approximately 100,000 more passengers than in the year preceding.

Pipelines

Most liquid petroleum products and natural gas are moved via pipeline. The largest network of liquid lines serves the large oilfield in the Ploiesti area and the smaller one in west-central Walachia. They connect the fields with refineries and transport the refined products to Danube River ports and to Constanta on the Black Sea coast. Lines also transfer crude oil from the Moldavian oilfield to its refineries, but there were no lines in 1970 to transport finished products from those refineries.

Natural gas is piped to all parts of Transylvania from sources in the center of the province, but the Carpathians are an obstacle to its distribution to other parts of the country. One major line crosses the Transylvanian Alps to serve the Bucharest area, and another crosses the Moldavian Carpathians through Gheorghe Gheorghiu-Dej. It serves areas to the southeast as far as Galati, on the Danube River.

Merchant Marine

The country has a small, but growing, merchant marine. Although most of its ships are new, the more than 100 percent increase—to nearly 0.5 million deadweight tons—claimed to have been achieved between 1967 and 1969 was accounted for by less than a dozen ships, consisting of two tankers and some bulk cargo carriers that were built in Japan. The government releases no official statistics on its merchant fleet, but fragmentary information indicates that before 1967 it consisted of about thirty-five ships. One of them was a 2,000-deadweight-ton passenger-cargo vessel, and there were a few tankers totaling something over 100,000 deadweight tons. The remainder were freighters, averaging about 5,000 deadweight tons each.

Statistics on goods transported by sea substantiate the size and growth of the merchant marine fleet. Until about 1960 it had relatively little importance, but by 1966 cargo carried was almost ten times that of 1960, and by 1969 it had again tripled. The impressive growth statistics notwithstanding, sea transport in 1969 accounted for only about 1.5 percent of the total cargo transported.

Constanta is the major port on the Black Sea, but some smaller seagoing vessels go up the Danube River to Galati and Braila. All of the larger river towns, and all of those on rail lines that cross it or terminate at the river, are considered river ports. Mangalia, on the Black Sea coast south of Constanta and about five miles from the Bulgarian border, is a secondary seaport but has the country's largest naval installation (see ch. 13).