Coordination of the National Economic Plans of Socialist Countries, the activities of socialist countries to coordinate foreign economic sections of their national economic plans, aimed at utilising in the best way possible the political and economic advantages of the world socialist economic system through the planned extension of international socialist division of labour (see Division of Labour, Socialist International). Cooperation in planning, especially plan coordination, is a basic method of organising cooperation and extending the international socialist division of labour. The coordination of economic plans furthers the implementation of the coordinated economic policy of the communist and workers’ parties based on a profound analysis of the resources and demands posed by the development of their socialist economies. It makes it possible to speed up their economic development rates, to provide the possibility of better manoeuvring their economic resources, and to produce more economically at less cost. Plans are coordinated on both a bilateral and multilateral basis within the framework of the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance, especially questions too great for one or two countries to deal with, and which require the joint efforts of several or all the CMEA countries. Based on the experience of the joint activities of the countries belonging to this international economic organisation, coordination embraces primarily the industries which most greatly rely on foreign trade exchanges and international specialisation and cooperation in their development; it also involves the scientific and technological research of mutual interest to several of these countries, and the transport network servicing foreign trade. The development of economic cooperation of the countries belonging to the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance created the possibility of jointly dealing with several important economic tasks, among them the fuel and power balance, and questions of extending specialisation and cooperation of production. At the same time, the coordination of economic plans does not restrain the economic initiatives of the individual countries; on the contrary, it encourages it, for it enables the better and more complete use of all productive capacities to further the economic growth of every socialist country, as well as to accelerate the development of the world socialist community as a whole. One of the most important features of the coordination of the socialist countries’ economic plans at the present stage is the elaboration of a fiveyear coordinated plan of multilateral integration measures. Coordination of fiveyear plans is supplemented by a number of other forms of jointly planned activities, which constitute an integral planning mechanism of the CMEA countries’ integration. The most notable among them are the long-term special cooperation programmes. Coordination of national economic plans has become not only the most regular, but also the most complex form of joint planned activities.