With a turnover of 5.5 billion lei in 1969, the Soviet Union has been by far the most important of Romania's trading partners. Czechoslovakia and the German Democratic Republic (East Germany) were next in importance within COMECON, with a trade volume of 1.5 billion and 1.2 billion lei, respectively, in 1969. Among trading partners in Western Europe, West Germany occupied first place, with a trade volume of almost 1.8 billion lei, followed by Italy with a volume of 1.2 billion lei and France with 0.9 billion lei. The People's Republic of China has been the main communist trading partner outside Europe, with an annual volume of about 0.5 billion lei in 1968 and 1969. _Table 6._ _Foreign Trade of Romania, by Groups of Countries, 1960 and 1969_ (in millions of lei)[1] ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1960[2] 1969[2] ------------------------- ------------------------ Country Group Exports Imports Total Exports Imports Total ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Western industrial states 918 913 1,831 2,980 4,432 7,412 COMECON[3] 2,821 2,636 5,458 5,042 4,819 9,862 Other communist states 318 206 524 781 506 1,286 Developing countries 245 131 376 996 686 1,682 ----- ----- ------ ----- ------ ------ Total 4,302 3,887 8,189 9,799 10,443 20,242 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1: For value of leu, see Glossary. 2: Totals may not add because of rounding. 3: Council for Mutual Economic Assistance. Source: Adapted from U.S. Department of Commerce, Office of Technical Services, Joint Publications Research Service--JPRS Series (Washington), _Translations on Eastern Europe: Economic and Scientific Affairs_, "Foreign Trade Reform Analyzed," _Vierteljahresshefte zur Wirtschaftsvorschung_, West Berlin, July-September 1971, (JPRS 54,691, Series No. 580, 1971). Trade between Romania and the United States has been small because of legal restrictions in the United States against trade with communist countries. The trade volume doubled from about US$40 million in 1969 to US$80 million in 1970 but declined to about US$65 million in 1971. About 80 percent of the trade in 1969 and 1970 was accounted for by Romanian imports; in 1971 the trade was more nearly balanced. Comparable Romanian statistics are available only for 1969. They show a lower volume of trade and a smaller trade deficit. No explanation of this discrepancy is available.