The MacNeil/Lehrer Report; Poland -- Food

[Tease]

ROBERT MacNEIL [voice-over]: These are CARE food packages of the kind being sent to Poland now. One month of martial law has not solved Poland's acute food crisis, and private Western agencies are rushing to help.

[Titles]

MacNEIL: Good evening. Polish Deputy Prime Minister Jerzy Ozdowski said today that Polish authorities would like to end martial law by February 1st, but that the timetable depends on the situation. Ozdowski was speaking to Western reporters at a news conference in Warsaw. Martial law was imposed a month ago tomorrow and, while physical resistance by Polish workers may have died out, there is no sign that the military rulers have been able to create a mood for productive cooperation. In fact, the authorities have admitted that one of their problems -- the food supply -- has recently grown worse. Since President Reagan imposed sanctions against Poland, direct U.S. government food shipments have stopped, but private American organizations have stepped up their efforts and Polish authorities are apparently letting those shipments through. Tonight, the politics and the practical problems of feeding Poland. Jim?

JIM LEHRER: Robin, there are some who argue food, not politics, is at the root of all that has happened in Poland thus far, and all that is still to come. It was the shortage and cost of food -- most particularly, staples such as meat -- that brought worker dissatisfaction to its original boil 17 months ago, a boil that resulted in the founding of the Solidarity trade union. It was the Communist government's continued inability to solve the food problem that helped Solidarity grow and flourish to a national movement that included many of Poland's farmers forming a separate, rural Solidarity union. But Solidarity couldn't solve the food problem, either. While its various strikes, protests, and negotiations brought meaningful social, political and labor reform, the long lines and high prices for scarce food products continued from one end of Poland to the other, and they continue to this day under martial law, as the new military government wrestles with the constant dilemma of how to feed the people. Many observers say now the success of Prime Minister Jaruzelski's efforts to control the country could ultimately be decided more on the issue of meat and potatoes than on guns and bullets. Robin?

MacNEIL: One of the principal agencies sending food to Poland is CARE, the international aid and relief organization. Its executive director is Philip Johnston, who returned a few days ago from a visit to Poland where he talked with top government officials. Dr. Johnston brought back a message to President Reagan from General Jaruzelski, Poland's prime minister. What kind of message was that to President Reagan, Dr. Johnston?

Dr. PHILIP JOHNSTON: It was an oral message dealing with the sanctions. I would describe it as being conciliatory. It dealt with the channel of communication which President Reagan left untouched, which is humanitarian aid, and it has already been communicated to President Reagan, and hopefully it will help improve the situation.

MacNEIL: Would it be fair to say that General Jaruzelski looked benignly on further humanitarian -- or further food aid to Poland?He would like further food aid?

Dr. JOHNSTON: I think quite clearly that anybody who is responsible for a population of 36 million people that is at the moment in danger because of insufficient food has got to be concerned.

MacNEIL: How much in danger is that population from your own observation and what you were able to gather there?

Dr. JOHNSTON: The food situation in Poland today is as bad as it was last July when I was there. What has changed is the degree of hardship that one must endure in order to obtain the rations which, of late, have been reduced and the price has been increased. The bitter winter that has set in in Poland at the moment is aggravating the situation. Last July, when people waited in lines outside the shop in balmy summer weather, it was not uncomfortable except it was difficult waiting that long. But now, to wait in sub-zero weather and the blizzard conditions they have there is very, very hard.

MacNEIL: Are people going hungry?

Dr. JOHNSTON: Yes.

MacNEIL: I mean, are people in danger of not having enough to eat? I mean, are they in danger of malnutrition or of starving?

Dr. JOHNSTON: In my opinion, yes. We have provided assistance to Poles who are malnourished right now, and the possibility is that the percentage of malnourished people in Poland is going to increase unless additional food supplies -- particularly fortified foods -- are made available.

MacNEIL: Are you satisfied that the shortage of food is because there is a real shortage or scarcity of food, and not because of manipulation or the holding back of supplies for political reasons by the military authorities?

Dr. JOHNSTON: I cannot categorically answer that question. My feeling is that it is not because they are being hoarded by some entity. I have not heard of anyone who has been able to find locations where this food is hoarded in such large volumes. I think there is just not that kind of food available in Poland to feed the Polish population, and it has to come from outside.

MacNEIL: Did you in your talks with Polish government officials get assurances that food you sent would be delivered to people you considered deserving?

Dr. JOHNSTON: Yes.

MacNEIL: And it would not be interfered with by the government?

Dr. JOHNSTON: Yes. But even more specifically, it'll be delivered by CARE people -- no intermediaries are involved in the process.

MacNEIL: And that was guaranteed?

Dr. JOHNSTON: That was guaranteed.

MacNEIL: And do you have evidence that the food you have sent so far is in fact being delivered that way and distributed that way?

Dr. JOHNSTON: Yes.

MacNEIL: With no interference by the government?

Dr. JOHNSTON: With no interference, but with the participation of local welfare committees. The selection process is done by a committee at the urban area, and CARE spot-checks the need of some of the individuals on that list. We can't do them all; there are just too many. So we spot-check it on a random basis.

MacNEIL: But you're satisfied that the aid you are sending is reaching the people it should reach?

Dr. JOHNSTON: Yes. But remember that we affect a targeted population of Poland. We only deal with the elderly -- the ones who find it very difficult to wait in these lines -- and preschool children. We do not deal with the ages between them.

MacNEIL: Well, thank you. Jim?

LEHRER: The largest private U.S. shipper of food products to Poland right now is the Catholic Church. It's done under the auspices of Catholic Relief Services, the overseas aid and development agency of American Catholics. The executive director of CRS is Bishop Edwin Broderick. Bishop, are you having problems getting food into the country?

Bishop EDWIN BRODERICK: No, we're not, Jim. We have an agreement with the Polish government, and they have respected it thus far. Thus far we have sent about 25 million pounds of food, about a million pounds of warm clothing.

LEHRER: This is just since when? In the last six months?

Bishop BRODERICK: Well, we started our shipment in July and we're programmed to go about every two weeks. And our last shipment left the other day. It takes about 12 days to get from the Port of Newark to Gdansk.

LEHRER: So you're getting it to Poland.

Bishop BRODERICK: Yes.

LEHRER: What about getting it --

Bishop BRODERICK: I have just come back from Poland. I was there until about the 8th of December.I went there privately to find out how the food was being allocated and distributed, and I was very comforted in the fact that there is tremendous accountability there -- which is really credibility -- and there's great responsibility, so far as I could see. No ripoffs, no black market. We work through the infrastructure of the Catholic Church in Poland, and through the social service committee of the church, and we have assurance -- and I was on -- just as Phil said, he spot-checked it. I went to many warehouses and depots, and I did see that the food really is getting to the neediest of the needy people.

LEHRER: Who decides who gets this food? The food that you send.

Bishop BRODERICK: Church authorities are the ones who decide in our case. As I say, we deal exclusively with the Catholic Church in Poland, and they have a very fine witness value of the people who need it.

LEHRER: Since martial law has been imposed has there been any change in the procedures? Any change in the way the government --

Bishop BRODERICK: No, we have witnesses and messages in and out of the country that there has been absolutely no change in the procedure that we started in July.

LEHRER: Where does your agency get the food that you send to Poland -- this 25 million --

Bishop BRODERICK: A considerable amount of our food comes from large food processors who either sell it at a very reasonable cost or donate it and ship it down to the Port and containerize it for us. We also had a collection in many of the Catholic churches throughout the United States and thus far I think we've amassed about $3.7 million. We have many private benefactors who send money to us.We also have an agreement with the United States Commodity Credit Corporation where we buy food at what is considered to be "favorable concessionary price." These are dairy products such as fortified powdered milk, cheese and butter.

LEHRER: You heard what Mr. Johnston said. Let me ask you the same question. What is your reading of the seriousness of the food shortage problem in Poland in relationship to nutrition and to potential starvation of some of the people?

Bishop BRODERICK: I think the food shortage today is much worse than it was when we started in July. Our big problem in July was trying to convince our people that there was a food shortage in Poland. They said, "Well, the Polish people look so healthy and well. They're farmers." But now the question being asked of us, "Is the food really getting to the people?" So there is a great shortage -- nothing but empty shelves stare at you when you go there. People run after bakery trucks trying to get a loaf of bread -- maybe 50 loaves on the truck and 500 people queued up. So there is really a necessity for food, particularly, as Phil said, in the child -- in small children between two and four years of age, there is a fear of brain damage through malnutrition. Also in the aged people. They don't have the endurance to stand on lines waiting for some kind of food, so they have to be taken care of and given a priority.

LEHRER: Thank you. Robin?

MacNEIL: Now the views of a supporter of the Polish union movement, Solidarity, whose leaders were interned when martial law was imposed. Piotr Naimski was one of the organizers of Warsaw Solidarity. He is now a spokesman for the Committee in Support of Solidarity here in New York, where he is a research biochemist. Does Solidarity support these private food shipments to Poland?

PIOTR NAIMSKI: Yes. At the meeting of Solidarity's members in Zurich in December --

MacNEIL: A meeting you attended?

Mr. NAIMSKI: Yes, I attended.We discussed this problem and we are in favor of any [unintelligible] aid to Poland, but we are against the aid going through government agencies. And this is the reason we support Reagan's sanctions.

MacNEIL: President Reagan's sanctions. But, both of these gentlemen from CARE and the Catholic Relief Services say that their food is being distributed by their own people or by their own agencies, by and large, and that gives you no problems?

Mr. NAIMSKI: I think there is a difference between these two ways. CARE help is distributed finally by council created by the administrative councils -- by the government. Aid which is sent by Catholic Relief Service is distributed quite independently by special bodies created by Polish Catholic Church.

MacNEIL: Does that mean Solidarity believes that only food aid sent through the Catholic Church will not be manipulated by the government?

Mr. NAIMSKI: Yes, in my opinion it is like that. Vice Prime Minister Rakowski said in August last year that who controls food has the power. And these military authorities, they would like to control any food and to use -- I am afraid -- this food as a tool against the people. For example, you will behave correctly; you will get powerful.

MacNEIL: But Mr. Johnston said that he was satisfied that in the case of CARE, whether it was going through these administrative councils or not, that the food that they were sending was actually reaching the people who needed it.

Mr. NAIMSKI: You see, I think it is a possibility that this help can be sent by other than Catholic Relief Service and agencies and other way than Catholic Church, but it should be under very strict control from outside, not only to the level of this administrative council, but this control should be also over the distribution -- over the list, final list of people --

MacNEIL: Of who gets it?

Mr. NAIMSKI: Yes.

MacNEIL: I see. Finally, does it concern you, from a political standpoint, that by sending this food through private channels as it's going, the West is in effect relieving Jaruzelski's regime of one of its main problems, and therefore making life easier for him?

Mr. NAIMSKI: It is connected, too, with this problem I told before. In some way it is like that, but the situation is so bad that we can't avoid --

MacNEIL: The humanitarian consideration must come first, you mean?

Mr. NAIMSKI: Yes. And the question is not to give this help for manipulation to the government's hands.

MacNEIL: I see. I see. I don't want to put words in your mouth, but would your thought be that the humanitarian need is so great that even if there is a risk of it supporting the Jaruzelski regime it is a risk that has to be taken?

Mr. NAIMSKI: Yes, I think so.

MacNEIL: Thank you. Jim?

LEHRER: Finally, the Polish food problem as seen by the U.S. government. That view comes from John Scanlan, Deputy Assistant Secretary of State of European Affairs, and head of the State Department's Polish working group. First, Mr. Secretary, do you agree that those who control food control the power in Poland?

Sec. JOHN SCANLAN: Well, I think you can make that statement, but as Mr. Naimski said, there are people that are suffering, and you do have to have a humanitarian consideration very much in mind, and this is what President Reagan had in mind on the 23rd of December when he announced sanctions and said we would exclude humanitarian food aid from these sanctions as long as we were convinced that the food was getting to the people.

LEHRER: Well, what kind of food help -- humanitarian help from private agencies -- do you believe is getting to the people and is thus proper under your definition?

Sec. SCANLAN: Well, we agree with Bishop Broderick. We think the Catholic Church does an excellent job of distributing food aid to the Polish people. The Catholic Church is the one institution in Poland that has popular credibility, and it is of course a widespread organization. To be a Pole is to be a Catholic, almost, and therefore the food does get to the people. We know the organization they have. We talk to them and we are convinced that they are doing the job. CARE has also been there. They've had representatives there, and they have told us that they are convinced. We've talked to the Polish Ministry of Foreign Affairs; we've had assurances from them twice in the last few weeks. We were very pointed with them. We said that the U.S. government assistance to humanitarian food programs would be dependent upon our ability, either directly or through private organizations, to monitor the food assistance. And they've given us assurance that they would cooperate with CARE and CRS and any other private agency to make sure that it's properly monitored.

LEHRER: Do you see the massage that Mr. Johnston delivered today to President Reagan as being a significant breakthrough in this whole area?

Sec. SCANLAN: Well, of course, I haven't seen that message. It went to the President and until the President shares it with the Department of State I can't comment on it.

LEHRER: What is the Department of State's view as to how serious this problem is right now for the Polish people?

Sec. SCANLAN: Well, I think it's very serious. Let's spend a little bit of time talking about Poland's imports from the United States of agricultural commodities. Over the past several years they've imported from us agricultural commodities on various forms of U.S. government credit programs at the rate of $600 to $700 million a year. Last year, for instance, 1981, about $640 million under the Commodity Credit Corporation program of short-term credits; another $71 million we sold them -- for Polish currency we sold them powdered milk, surplus dairy products -- butter, some cheese. In July we sold them another $55 million worth of corn -- that's about 360,000 tons of corn -- on PL-480 Food For Peace credits. The President has said that since these are agricultural commodities; this isn't food as such -- feed grains and things like that. One of the sanctions was that we will no longer sell these products on credit. If they can pay cash, that's another thing, but we will no longer give them credits for this until they life martial law, release their several thousand political prisoners and get involved in serious negotiations.

LEHRER: And that is not defined as humanitarian aid -- humanitarian food aid?

Sec. SCANLAN: Well, you know, obviously, eventually it winds up as food because feed grains go to feed cattle and there is a program the Poles have for importing corn to feed their broiler chickens, and so eventually it does hurt the food supply program in Poland.But we have no way of monitoring that. It goes to the government, the government distributes it and, as Mr. Naimski says, then you get into the question of he who controls food, in a sense, does control the political situation.

LEHRER: What evidence do you have here back in Washington that the government is in fact trying to manipulate the food supply because they know as well as we know that, as everyone knows, that food is very crucial to their survival?

Sec. SCANLAN: Well, we have no specific evidence about manipulation as such; a lot of rumors during the fall, summer about food stocks being hoarded by the government in warehouses around the country and other reports that after the declaration of martial law some of this food miraculously appeared on the market. You will get lots of stories like that, but the fact remains that the food situation in Poland just is generally serious. We have given, I think, the total is something like $61 million in government credits -- government support to CRS and to CARE -- Catholic Relief Service and CARE -- to help meet this, and I think there will be more forthcoming if that which is in the pipeline becomes exhausted and there is a need for more. I think the government would clearly provide more, as long as we were certain that both CARE and Catholic Relief Service and any other agency involved could monitor the distribution.

LEHRER: Thank you. Robin?

MacNEIL: Dr. Johnston, you heard what Mr. Naimski said, that you go through these administrative councils down to the bottom and you don't know, unless you know to whom they choose to deliver the food, who actually gets it.

Dr. JOHNSTON: That is correct. He also said that the food might be used to influence their behavior. Remember, we are talking about pensioneers; we are talking about the people who are 65 and over, and we are talking about little children. Now, if they are politically significant, so that the government wants to influence how little children act, or how very old people act, I am unaware of it. We know that those people that we deal with are in desperate need of food. We know they're hungry. We have verified it with our own international American staff that they're hungry, they're in need, and they are the ones into whose hands we place these CARE food packages. As for their political power of clout, I seriously doubt they have any.

MacNEIL: Mr. Naimski?

Mr. NAIMSKI: I can only say that it is quite easy to press a mother who has children and has no food. On the other side, we know, for example, that special police forces in Poland are paid in chocolate and oranges. So in this serious situation still government is playing with food. For example, some regions or some professions are, I can say, paid by more food than others. It's a, for example, difference between Silesia and Baltic seaside. So with this small amount of food, government still is trying to make their own policy.

MacNEIL: Mr. Scanlan, can you really separate food and politics in a situation like this?Take the question I asked Mr. Naimski earlier. Doesn't sending food for humanitarian need in effect help the Jaruzelski regime by removing one of the main sources of pressure on it?

Sec. SCANLAN: Well, that's a difficult question because there is no doubt that it does relieve the pressure on him. But at the same time you've got a country of 36 million people with long-standing ties to the United States and, to the degree possible, as long as we can monitor it and get it to the people without giving the Polish government credit for it, I think we have got to do what we can.

MacNEIL: Do you have a view on that, Bishop?

Bishop BRODERICK: I would agree with Mr. Scanlan's conception of it. We don't have that particular problem. We deal on the humanitarian basis. We feel that we're helping the people and not the government, that if the government wants, by attrition, to starve these people, that's a form of warfare. It's a form of, almost, a slow atomic bomb being diffused on them. And we prescind from politics. We feel there's a humanitarian need.These people actually are starving at this time; they need food. God has so prodigally blessed us with the gifts of nature here in the States that we're willing to share. And it's a great tribute to the American people that in the last month or so they have just poured out their hearts and their pocketbooks to take care of this.

MacNEIL: What should the Polish regime of General Jaruzelski in your view, Mr. Naimski, do to earn the lifting of the sanctions on the main food shipments that Mr. Reagan has imposed?

Mr. NAIMSKI: Withdraw martial law, to release all arrested people, to restore Solidarity as it was before, and to start negotiations seriously.

MacNEIL: Are those the conditions that -- specifically the conditions the American government has set, Mr. Scanlan?

Sec. SCANLAN: Those are not only the conditions the American government has set, those are the conditions that were very well enunciated yesterday in Brussels by NATO at a ministerial level.

MacNEIL: Do you believe, Mr. Scanlan, that until those conditions are met, and these much larger supplies of agricultural commodities will be released again, the the food problems of Poland can really be met?

Sec. SCANLAN: I think they can be met on an emergency basis, provided that organizations like Catholic Relief Service, CARE and others continue to do the good work that they are doing, and provided that we get the assurances from the Polish government that they can be in there -- CARE, for instance, with its representatives and the Catholic Church -- to make sure that it's monitored.

MacNEIL: Do you have any sense -- either you, Dr. Johnston, or you, Bishop Broderick -- of the adequacy of the private aid that's getting in?

Dr. JOHNSTON: No, our --

MacNEIL: I mean, you're targeting yours to certain people, but --

Dr. JOHNSTON: We will provide food assistance for two million people; most of them are the aged.

MacNEIL: Do you have a sense, Bishop, of the adequacy of the supplies that are getting there, and how much more may be needed?

Bishop BRODERICK: We are touching the surface, I think. I don't think we're going too deep on that even though thus far we have sent about 24 million pounds of food.

MacNEIL: Does that mean that at this moment an unlimited amount could be usefully sent?

Bishop BRODERICK: Yes. We could send more and they could absorb much more and they could distribute it, too. We have assurance of that, and that's what we're working on now.

MacNEIL: I come back to the question to you, Mr. Naimski. Is the Polish food situation, as you understand it, only solvable ultimately when larger government-to-government credits and shipments are resumed?

Mr. NAIMSKI: No, of course not. The question is of the structure of Polish economy and organization of Polish economy. And without really economic reform in Poland this problem will be still alive. This is what Solidarity wanted to negotiate with government before crackdown.

MacNEIL: Well, we have to leave it there. Mr. Scanlan, thank you very much for joining us in Washington; Mr. Naimski, Dr. Johnston, Bishop Broderick, thank you. Good night, Jim.

LEHRER: Good night, Robin.

MacNEIL: That's all for tonight. We will be back tomorrow night. I'm Robert MacNeil. Good night.