nsify the public campaign against
waste and the irresponsible attitude toward public funds and for tighter
financial discipline. An implacable campaign is also to be waged against
wrongs done to the citizens in the use of public funds, illegal
formation and misappropriation of funds by economic organizations,
irregularities in the supply of materials, failure to produce consumer
goods despite the availability of needed resources, accumulation of
excessive inventories, and pilferage.

Many apparent violations of economic and budgetary discipline arise
because of the frequently inadequate knowledge or understanding by
personnel at all levels of the economy of the constantly changing laws
and regulations concerning the operation and interrelation of the
diverse economic units, particularly in the area of finance. The changes
in laws and regulations are the result of an unceasing search for a
system that would provide effective incentives toward conscientious and
efficient work to all gainfully employed persons.

BANKING AND CURRENCY

Banking

Since early 1971 the country's banking system has consisted of the
Bulgarian National Bank and two semi-independent banks attached to it:
the Bulgarian Foreign Trade Bank and the State Savings Bank. This
banking system emerged after three reorganizations in the 1967-70 period
and conforms to the general pattern of institutional and management
concentration in the economy. In addition to serving as the central bank
of issue, the Bulgarian National Bank, an independent agency under the
Council of Ministers, is directly responsible for financing all sectors
and phases of the economy other than foreign trade and consumer credit,
in which fields it supervises the activities of the Bulgarian Foreign
Trade Bank and the State Savings Bank. The bank is also responsible for
exercising close control over the economic units that it finances, with
a view to ensuring the fulfillment of all national economic plans and
the scrupulous adherence to existing laws and regulations.

A minimum of current information was available in mid-1973 on the
structure of the banks, the relationships between them, and their
financial operations. Official statistics are limited to annual data on
bank credits for investment and on the volume of outstanding short- and
long-term loan balances for the banking system as a whole. Data on
outstanding loans are broken down by type of borrower and, in the case
of short