Economic Goals Not Met, Soviet Report Shows : Official Figures Reveal Shortcomings Despite Gorbachev’s Reforms

Nearly four years into his stewardship, Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev finds that his program of perestroika, or restructuring of his country’s cumbersome economy, is still struggling to show any significant payoff, a key government statistical report indicated Saturday.

Peppering its annual assessment with adjectives such as “serious,” “tense” and “acute,” the State Committee for Statistics offered little encouragement to Soviet consumers who increasingly grumble that Gorbachev’s policies seem to be achieving much more dramatic changes abroad than at home.

“The country’s financial situation remains difficult,” the statistical committee summed up. Portions of its report were distributed by the Tass news agency.

As if to confirm that analysis, Gorbachev, who became Communist Party chief here in March, 1985, conceded before Moscow party leaders Saturday that “the new processes are going very slowly.”

The statistics committee said the economy failed by a wide margin to live up to the government’s target in the key measure known as national income, which is a sensitive indicator of the availability of consumer goods.

Crime on the Increase

It was particularly gloomy about supplies of food, furniture and other household items, and it said that the prospect of satisfying the population’s demands for recreational facilities “remains acute.” Crime is on the increase, with nearly one out of five crimes committed by a person under the influence of alcohol, it added.

There were bright spots as well, such as a sharp improvement in the efficiency of Soviet workers. But even that optimistic development was at least partially offset by an even sharper increase in the average industrial worker’s pay. Economists say that when paychecks rise faster than labor productivity, the inevitable result is inflation, which eats away at the real value of those salaries.

Long depicted as an economic evil endemic to the capitalist system, inflation is now an admittedly growing problem here as well. According to Tass, the committee announced unspecified measures “aimed at checking price rises on goods and services as compared with their improved consumer properties and quality, and against the reduction of production of cheap goods, which are in high demand, to the detriment of the interests of the population.”

Nevertheless, the committee’s report is likely to cause the leadership even more concern, suggesting as it does that Soviet citizens face the doubly unhappy prospect of continuing shortages and upward price pressure on those items that are available.

Gorbachev and some of his key advisers are clearly worried that consumer discontent could threaten his entire reform program, providing a lightning rod that his political opponents--especially the bureaucrats most threatened by change--could use against him.

Gorbachev has appeared increasingly defensive about criticism that perestroika has done nothing to improve the lot of average workers, charging that instead of faulting the reform, detractors should put the blame for today’s economic problems where it belongs--on past mismanagement.

During his speech Saturday, extensive portions of which were broadcast on the main evening television news program, Gorbachev attacked those who are urging him to ease the shortages by importing more consumer goods.

“Of course we can buy consumer goods abroad for one or two years,” he said. “But what will we buy in three years? It’s necessary to develop our own industries.”

Influenced by the smallest Soviet grain harvest since 1985, the State Committee for Statistics reported that total agricultural output here grew by a minuscule 0.7% in 1988, far short of the 6.3% growth target in the government’s economic plan.

The harvest totaled 197 million tons of grain, according to the report--slightly better than the 195 million tons estimated last Monday by a senior planning official but still 38 million tons short of the government’s target and lower than Western predictions.

“Despite certain growth of the production of foodstuffs, the food situation continues to be tense,” the statistical panel pointed out.