Documents / FOIA release
This Joint Committee Print, dated December 8, 1982, gathers studies that the Central Intelligence Agency's Directorate of Intelligence prepared for the Joint Economic Committee of the US Congress. It gives estimates of Soviet gross national product for 1950 to 1980, with indexes of industrial production, agricultural production and consumption, and explains the methods and data behind them. The foreword says official Soviet statistics inflate growth and that the CIA measures offer a more accurate picture. The document contains no UFO material.
“Gross”60+ pages
Approved for Release: 2019/07/19 C05210421 Table 2 Commodities Included in CIA and Soviet Indexes of Agricultural Production Components of CIA Index Addditional Components Used in Soviet Gross Output of Agriculture A. Crops l. Grain 2. Technical crops a. fiber crops: cotton and flax b. sunflower seed c. soybeans d. other oil seeds e. sugarbeets f. tobacco and makhorka g. tea 3. Potatoes 4. Vegetables 5. Fruits, berries, and nuts 1. Byproducts of grain crops (straw,/ chaff, and so forth) 2. Technical crops a. other fiber crops b. essential oil raw materials c. medicinal plants d. chicory root e. seeds and planting material for technical crops f. other technical crops (hops, tea, and so forth) g. Other oilseeds 3. Feed crops a. root crops b. hay c. green fodder d. silage crops e. other feed crops f. seeds of feed crops 4. Crops for green manure 5. Flowers and decorative plants 6. Expenses for starting and caring for perennial plantings 7. Unfinished production (change in value during the year of expenses for sowing winter crops and soil preparation) B. Livestock l. Meat (slaughter weight) a. beef and veal b. pork c. mutton and kid d. poultry e. other meat 2. Change in number of livestock 3. Milk 4. Eggs 5. Wool 7. Silk cocoons 1. Weight gained by livestock during the year (liveweight) 2. Offspring and increase of working livestock (horses, camels, donkeys and mules) and of reindeer 3. Fur-bearing animals (hides and offspring) 4. Change in number of bee colonies 5. Fish breeding (young fish and fish catch) 6. Other animal products (hair, horns, feathers, manure, beeswax, silkworm @225) Procurement, which buys agricultural commodities from state farms, collective farms, and individual private sector producers. Other state purchasing orga- nizations are the Central Union of Consumer Cooper- atives, and the Ministries of the Food Industry, Meat and Dairy Industry, Light Industry, and Trade. The second major sales channel for farm products is the system of collective farm markets where producers sell agricultural commodities at prices determined largely by the interplay of supply and demand. Prices paid in collective farm markets normally exceed procurement prices, because products sold through this channel are of higher quality or because a given product is scarce or unavailable in state retail stores. For example, in 1970 the average collective farm market price for milk was almost double that paid by procurement organizations. In practice, average realized prices could not be obtained for each commodity in the index. Surrogates, some more satisfactory than others, had to be used in a number of cases. Although average realized prices for all grain, vegetables, and meat can be estimated, the prices needed to value each individual type of grain, vegetable, and meat are missing. Data on average collective farm market prices for individual commodities are especially scarce and must be esti- mated in many cases. Soviet literature provides rela- tively ample data on list procurement prices "‘ for individual commodities but obtaining USSR-wide averages of prices actually paid in a given year is difficult. In the case of honey and some oilseeds, we had to substitute RSFSR list procurement prices. ‘° L Collective farm procurement prices paid in 1970 are /- " List procurement prices are paid by procurement organizations for products of standard quality. Prices for at given product are differentiated by region in the USSR. In Belorussia, for example, in 1970-72 there were 113 price zones for milk; the milk prices ranged from 170 to 620 rubles per ton (N .I. Goryachko, Obosnovaniye sistemy zakupochnykh tsen, Minsk, 1978, p. 20). List prices exclude adjustments made at the time of sale for product quality. Grain with moisture content above standard levels, for example, will be purchased at prices below list prices. List procurement prices also exclude bonuses paid for sale above the plan quota. '° Although the RSFSR prices are only for state and collective farms and exlude the private sector, this is not a source of significant error. The private sector produces almost no oilseeds, and the price for honey was made the same for all producers in 1970 (Zakupki sel'skokhozyaystvennykh produktov, no. 9, 1970, p. 1). 258 Approved for Release: 2019/07/19 C05210421
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FOIA release, from the cia-readingroom collection. The PDF is mirrored here; the original link is under it. 399 pages are in the text index: search them above, or from the library's search.