	soviet  target indicates output recent announcements from moscow of next year s  production targets indicate that the soviets are estimating this year s  crop at to mln tonnes agriculture department analysts said usda is projecting the soviet crop at mln tonnes but some earlier estimates from soviet officials were that the  crop could match the record of mln tonnes moscow outlined its economic targets for on monday putting the  harvest goal at mln tonnes an analyst of soviet agriculture at usda noted that a recent article in izvestia said soviet  production in is planned to be to mln tonnes more than expected this year this indicates that their own estimate is for a to mln tonne  crop the analyst said in calculating moscow s crop estimate usda used the mln tonne production goal as well as a mln tonne figure published in a soviet economic journal this month usda s production estimate of mln tonnes reflects a range of to mln tonnes a usda source said late season rains damaged soviet crops slowed harvest progress and lowered soviet production analysts said while in the u s earlier this month soviet agriculture official viktor nikonov predicted that the  crop would be as good or better than last year s mln tonne harvest a member of nikonov s party commented that although mln tonnes of  were in the fields harvest problems would bring the final crop down to around mln tonnes reuter 
