Soviets Expect Exports to Drop Sharply in 1991 : Trade: Sales of crude oil, for example, are projected at half what they were in 1989. The nation’s economy is in a shambles.

The Soviet Union expects exports to drop sharply in 1991, with vital oil earnings being halved, the government newspaper Izvestia said.

A draft government trade plan predicted that exports would fall to $72 billion from $124 billion in 1989.

“Exports of our crude oil will be cut by about half and will reach only 61 million metric tons,” the paper said Friday.

Alarmed at the projections, a Soviet parliamentary committee rejected the plan Thursday, Izvestia reported.

Also on Thursday, the government devalued the ruble to try to boost exports.

It was not immediately clear why Soviet planners expect such a drastic fall in exports, although the economy is acknowledged to be in a shambles and oil production is steadily falling.

Part of the problem is that the country’s trade deficit has been growing. Earlier this year the Soviet Union experienced serious difficulty repaying debts to Western companies.

To make things worse, Izvestia said, $22 billion of next year’s $72 billion in projected exports “will go toward paying off our foreign debt.”

The Soviet Union’s foreign debt is estimated at $61 billion.

Izvestia said $18 billion that parliament had decided should be spent on much-needed foreign-made consumer goods has been cut to $2 billion under the plan.

Inefficient equipment and low levels of investment have meant that Soviet oil production has been gradually falling even as the Persian Gulf crisis has pushed prices up. The Soviet Union is the world’s largest producer of crude oil.

During discussion of the plan, parliamentary deputies asked senior officials why oil exports were projected to fall so steeply, Izvestia said. The paper said they received no satisfactory answers.

Last month the Soviet parliament approved the outlines of a compromise program for the transition to a market economy, starting next year.

The powerful Russian Federation, which said the program was too vague, is offering a more radical “500-day plan” to create a market economy in the republic by late 1992.