 Ben-Gurion believed that by choosing the members of the committee, he would be able to garner support both for the planning arrangements and their political aspects.Ben-Gurion was chairman of the committee, which also included Eliezer Kaplan, treasurer of the Jewish Agency, Eliezer Hoofien, Chairman of the Anglo-Palestine Bank, Emil Shmorek, head of the department of trade and industry at the Jewish Agency, and a three-person secretariat consisting of economists.The committee convened for the first time on October 11, 1943 at Kaplan's home, where the decision was taken to convene weekly at the Jewish Agency building in Jerusalem.