Old Kingdom by 1938. Between 1929 and 1937, fixed capital in the industry dropped by 10%, and the number of industrial workers in Bessarabia dropped from 5,400 in 1925 to 3,500 in 1937, while their overall number in Romania had increased by almost 27% during the same period. Between 1926 and 1937 the share of the food industry in the total production of large manufacturing industries increased from 77.1% to 92.4%, with sharp decreases observed in sectors with higher added value, such as the metalworking, textile and leather processing industries. Even so, the food industry failed to fulfill local needs; most industries heavily relied on manual labor and primitive technologies. Electricity production in Chișinău, Bessarabia's center and Romania's second-largest city, recorded in 1925 at 4.47 million kWh, only increased by 6.7% during the following decade, lagging far behind other Romanian cities: 572.3% in Galați, 238.2% in Bucharest, and over 101% in Iași. By the end of the 1930s, only one in seven Bessarabians had access to electricity, compared to one in four among the general Romanian population. The Romanian administration carried out many projects aimed at improving the infrastructure of the province to introduce European gauge and reorient it towards Romania. The total length of the railway lines in Bessarabia increased only by 78 km (from 1140 in 1918 to 1218 in 1940). Local businessmen remained dissatisfied with the pace of the construction of new railways (the Chișinău-Căinari was the only one built anew) and the closure of a number of lines. Road infrastructure was also improved, as new highways and bridges over the Prut were built, while part of the existing roads were repaired and paved, increasing the length of highways from 150 to 754 km. However, most other roads remained impassable during rainy periods. Shipping on the Dniester was closed, and was never established on the Prut. In the 1930s, new airports were built, telephone lines were laid out, and radio transmitters were installed; nevertheless, the region still lagged behind Transylvania and the Old Kingdom. According to Alla Skvortsova, overall, the share of Bessarabian enterprises in the Romanian industry fell between 1919 and 1937 from 9% to 5.7%, while the number of enterprises employing at least 20 employees dropping from 262 to 196. The share of investments in Bessarabian industry also fell from 0.3% in 1923 to 0.1% in 1936. Sociologist T. Al. Știrbu observed, commenting on the