Georgia headed a "league table" of industrial decline in the Commonwealth of Independent States in the first six months of 1994, but other former Soviet republics also reported big falls, Interfax said Friday.


Interfax, quoting figures from the CIS statistics office, said Georgian industrial output was 50 percent below year-ago levels in the first six months of 1994.


Ukrainian production was 36 percent below year-ago levels while output in Turkmenistan, Kyrgyzstan and Belarus was down 33 percent, 32 percent and 31.5 percent respectively.


Moldovan output fell 30 percent and output fell 29 percent in Kazakhstan and 25 percent in Azerbaijan.


The average fall in output for all the Commonwealth was 27.6 percent.


All countries in the loose grouping of former Soviet republics have faced problems adjusting to the breakup of the superpower and the collapse of trading ties between countries.


Inter-state debt is a big problem and most countries owe Russia large sums of money for supplies of fuel and energy -- now mostly sold at world prices.


Interfax said Russia's six-month industrial decline of 25.8 percent was just below the CIS average.


Industrial production declined 20 percent in Tajikistan while Uzbek output was 4 percent below year-ago levels.


Armenia, where 1993 output was hit by a series of explosions on a pipeline supplying gas through Georgia, was the only CIS country to report higher industrial output, Interfax said.


Six-month production there was 4 percent above the level in the first 11 months of 1993.


Economists have frequently cautioned against reading too much into economic data from former Soviet republics. Many statistics offices find it hard to assess newly emerging private industry accurately.