NEW COMMERCE (CENSUS BUREAU) ESTIMATE OF RUBLE VALUE OF SOVIET FOREIGN TRADE

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP85-01156R000100030043-7
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 2
• Document Creation Date: December 21, 2016
• Document Release Date: August 14, 2008
• Sequence Number: 43
• Publication Date: July 25, 1982
• Content Type: REPORT

Approved For Release 2008/09/04: CIA-RDP85-01156R000100030043-7 JUL 1982
Subject: New Commerce (Census Bureau) Estimate of Ruble Value of Soviet
Foreign Trade
1. The Census Bureau has just released a specialized study of the
domestic value of Soviet foreign trade for use in their reconstruction of
the Soviet input output table for 1972. The study is carefully researched
and is clearly the most authoritative one on the subject. Some of the
inferences drawn from the study's results, however, in press briefings and
articles are misleading.
. 2. Briefly, the study estimates the value of Soviet imports and
exports in domestic rubles at 18.6 percent and 6.8 percent respectively of
National Income (Soviet definition) in 1978, the last year covered. In
comparisons with Gross National Product (which is larger than national
income, Soviet concept, in that it includes services and depreciation
allowances), the import share becomes 12.6 percent and the export.share
4.7 percent.
3. These figures in domestic rubles give a very different picture for
imports than the figures that are most commonly used, based on comparisons
of the dollar value of Soviet imports and exports with estimates of the
dollar value of Soviet GNP. In terms of dollars for 1978, the import share
was 4.8 percent.,. and the export share, 4.1 percent. In other words,
imports are 2-1/2 times larger relative to GNP in terms of domestic rubles
than in terms of dollars.
4. The reasons for these large differences are complex.. They appear
to include the following factors:
o Imports of consumer goods are taxed extremely heaviTy, and
consequently are sold on the retail market at very high and rising
prices, which the Soviet people are willing to pay because they are
starved for quality, variety and style.
o Premium prices are charged for imports of machinery and other
producer goods, partly because of quality differences.
5. The--inference drawn by Commerce officials that these calculations
demonstrate-a-greater-Soviet dependence on foreign trade than was formerly
believed is-partly correct. A large part of Soviet imports are goods
which, because of-their-higher quality and,technology,.can be produced in
the USSR only at relatively high cost. The high prices of imported,
consumer goods, however, also reflect market shortages rather than just
high production costs. ,
6. In its coverage of the Census Bureau releases, the press has
treated-total Soviet foreign trade as if it represented trade with the West'
alone. In 1978, hard currency imports were about one-third of the total
dollar value of Soviet imports and hard currency exports were a quarter of
 Approved For Release 2008/09/04: CIA-RDP85-01156R000100030043-7
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total exports. The Commerce study does not calculate the domestic ruble
value of hard currency imports or exports. A reasonable guess for the
share of such imports in GNP in domestic rubles is 5 percent.
Approved For Release 2008/09/04: CIA-RDP85-01156R000100030043-7~