Energy and oil in Eastern Europe— Status and prospects

The energy economies of the states in Eastern Europe—East Germany, Poland, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Bulgaria and Romania—are in a state of transition.¹ This is just one aspect of their overall transition from communism to more liberal political and economic systems. Future developments of the energy sectors in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union will have important implications for world oil and energy market developments, since these countries comprise, as a group, the world's largest oil and gas producers, and they are the second largest energy consumers in the world.