the members
of which must be approved by the Council of Ministers upon the
recommendation of the bank's governor, who is also chairman of the
administrative council. In addition to the chairman, the administrative
council includes several vice presidents of the bank; the directors of
the bank's fourteen divisions; superintendents of some of the
subordinated units; delegates of the management of the Investment Bank,
the Bank for Agriculture and the Food Industry, and the Romanian Foreign
Trade Bank; experienced specialists from the bank's professional staff
and from the outside; and a delegate of the labor unions, designated by
the General Union of Trade Unions. The council as a whole and each
individual member are responsible to the Council of Ministers for the
entire activity of the bank.

The Investment Bank, created in 1948 and last reorganized in September
1971 with a capitalization of 700 million lei, serves to finance, and
exercise control over, investment projects of all state, collective,
consumer-cooperative, and other public organizations, with the exception
of collective farms and organizations subordinate to the Ministry of
Agriculture, Food Industry, and Waters. The control powers of the bank
extend not only to projects financed with its own resources but also to
projects financed through budgetary allocations and out of enterprise
profits. The bank's management is organized along the lines of the
administrative council of the National Bank.

The Investment Bank must participate in the preparation of draft plans
for the financing of all investment projects undertaken by central and
local state organizations from the ministerial down to the enterprise
level. During the formulation and implementation of these plans the bank
must ensure the most economical use of available resources. The bank is
also called upon to determine appropriate rates of depreciation for
fixed assets and to ensure that the required amortization payments to
the budget are made on time.

Two of the bank's main functions are the review of technical and
economic investment criteria submitted to it for approval by ministries
and other state agencies and the evaluation of the feasibility of
proposed investment projects on the basis of accepted standards; the
more important of these standards also require approval by the Council
of Ministers. Approval may be granted by the bank only for investment
projects that satisfy all legal requiremen