Below is the uncorrected machine-read text of this chapter, intended to provide our own search engines and external engines with highly rich, chapter-representative searchable text of each book. Because it is UNCORRECTED material, please consider the following text as a useful but insufficient proxy for the authoritative book pages.
Conclusion The absence of consensus on the central methodological questions addressed at this meeting provides a strong argument for further efforts to investigate and analyze the relevant questions. While some participants maintained that the current methodology provides the best estimates possible in a difficult situation, others registered serious reservations concerning the assumptions on which the AFC standard is based and the methods by which the CIA produces its estimates of both the size and rates of growth of the Soviet economy. A number of the challenges advanced at the meeting have suffered in the past from the absence of sufficient funding to support the research necessary to fully elaborate an alternative to the AFC model, and a consensus was reached that alter- native methodologies should be investigated in the future. The participants also concurred in the view that they had only been able to initiate an examination of the issues under review at this meeting, and that a major study would be necessary in order to reach definitive conclusions. 21
