Gertrude Enderle-Burcel, Dieter Stiefel, Alice Teichova (Hrsg.): Sonderband 9. „Zarte Bande” – Österreich und die europäischen planwirtschaftlichen Länder / „Delicate Relationships” – Austria and Europe’s Planned Economies (2006)
Eduard Kubů: Restoration and Régularisation of Economie Cooperation under the Circumstances of Accelerating Cold War
Eduard Kubû diplomacy, did not take place. Lack of Austrian compensatory goods was cited as the main problem.32 The strong Czechoslovak negotiating position also resulted in a change of the payment method in the coal trade. In addition to compensations in the form of goods, payments were also to be made in cash - in US dollars. It was agreed that 25-35,000 tons of brown coal and 6,000 tons of coke were to be exported to Austria every month for the price of 7 dollars per ton and 24 dollars per ton, respectively.33 Until the Communist takeover in February 1948 in Czechoslovakia, trade relations remained substantially unchanged. Paradoxically, the agreement on trade relations with Austria was signed after the Communists had come to power, completely changing the way of conducting international trade in Czechoslovakia. International trade was predominantly in private hands until 1948. However, immediately after the takeover it was nationalised and private companies were replaced by state-owned monopoly organisations for international trade. International trade was no longer only a sphere of business activities but it was also the means of meeting the strategic needs of the state, specifically the means of ensuring the necessary raw materials for production and for securing the food balance endangered by the catastrophically bad harvest, which was a consequence of the dry summer of 1947. The personnel purges in the Ministry of Foreign Trade and the incorporation of twenty privileged companies for conduct of international trade were carried out in a record-short period of five months. The Ministry became one of the many units managed by the State Planning Office and foreign trade became part of the nearly all-embracing planning system. However, this brought considerable problems right from the beginning and this was why “safety coefficients” were defined for the Ministry of Foreign Trade. Imports were subject to a safety coefficient of 20 percent; exports were subjected to a safety coefficient as high as 25 percent. This means that when the plan was prepared, it was expected that it would be fulfilled within these indisputably broad limits. This also has to be seen as one of the causes of failure to carry out the agreed deliveries.34 Even after the February takeover, both parties retained the old rhetoric expressing good will to extend mutual economic relations. The talks started in March 1948 were postponed to early June and the need for thorough preparations was cited as the reason. However, there was one thing that was different and this was the AMFA, PR, Viden 1947 [Vienna 1947], report dated 20.4.1947. NAP, MFA - APC, box 411, Svobodné Slovo [Free Word] 23.7.1947, article “Uhli Rakousku za dolary” [coal to Austria for dollars]. In the balance of its activities for 1948, the Ministry of Foreign Trade reported 92 percent achievement of the import plan and 81 percent achievement of the export plan and interpreted this as a success because the safety coefficients were far from having been applied in full. NAP, MFT 1945-1954, Sekretariat viceministra E. Löbla [seceretariat of vice-minister E. Löbl], box no. 29, Analÿza zahraniiniho obchodu CSR v r. 1948 [Analysis of Czechoslovak foreign trade], without number. 206
