Between 1954 and 1961 the amount of food shipped abroad under P.L. 480 grew steadily. However, since the law required that only commodities in surplus could be shipped under its terms, the main thrust of the program was the disposal of U.S. surpluses.56 When U.S. stocks were reduced to what were considered reasonable levels, offers to give or sell such commodities under P.L. 480 were withdrawn. This happened, for example, to butter, dry skim milk, cheese, and vegetable oils. Wheat, however, continued to be in surplus and was shipped abroad in large quantities.

There is no doubt that food aid under P.L. 480 has been massive, and that the proceeds from the sale of P.L. 480 food have made a substantial contribution to development. Agricultural exports under P.L. 480 for the period 1954-1967 amounted to $17.2 billion, of which about $11.0 billion was shipped under Title I of the act (sales for foreign currency). Food was supplied to 116 countries containing half the world's population.57 The development of Taiwan, Israel, and South Korea benefitted markedly from P.L. 480 assistance. In the view of at least one informed observer, India would not have survived as a democratic state without the great transfer of food on a concessional basis provided by P.L. 480.58 In Tunisia, food donated under Title II was used as wage payments on work relief projects.

In the 1960s food aid began to be used as an instrument of development. President Kennedy, on January 24, 1961, called for the constructive use of "American agricultural abundance" to promote peace and "to play an important role in helping to provide a more adequate diet" in the LDCs.59 Orville Freeman, then Secretary of Agriculture, urged similarly that the United States use its agricultural abundance to encourage economic growth in underdeveloped areas.60 Congress extended and expanded P.L. 480 assistance in 1961, and again in 1964 and 1965.

PRESENT STATUS OF PUBLIC LAW 480

As the program evolved, various defects became evident. Sometimes, a developing country would use U.S. surplus food shipments to replace commercial food imports, diverting the credits to the purchase of consumer goods which would not contribute to development. Sometimes the surplus imports were used to postpone the making of hard decisions in the modernization of a country's agriculture, or with regard to an explosively increasing population. Cochrane implies that the use of food in this manner lay behind the failure of food aid to make a significant contribution to development in those Latin American countries which received it.“ 61

Food assistance need not lead to unbalanced or lopsided development. But it can release officials in developing countries from the pressing obligation of taking distasteful steps necessary to sound development, by mitigating an immediate food shortage. The argument has been advanced that P.L. 480 assistance in the 1950s, by failing to oblige developing countries to take steps to limit popula

56 Orville Freeman. "World Without Hunger" (New York, Praeger, 1968), page 29. Willard W. Cochrane, "The World Food Problem" (New York, Crowell, 1969), page 134. 58 Ibid., page 138.

50 Ibid., pages 29, 30

60 Ibid., page 30.

61 Ibid., page 139.

tion growth as a condition of receiving U.S. food aid, actually encouraged them to ignore the problem in the belief that food from the United States would always be available in a time of crisis. Such an argument, however, overlooks the fact that even today family planning is reluctantly accepted in the developing countries. The problem did not seem so apparent or so pressing in the 1950s, and many developing countries were probably not as ready to adopt measures that would restrict population growth as they were to become a decade later. It is even possible they would not have accepted U.S. assistance for such activity, or would have pursued it in very desultory fashion, had P.L. 480 food been linked to population planning.

In 1966, P.L. 480 underwent a major overhaul; the program of food assistance was tied directly to the efforts of the developing countries to limit their population growth. These changes can be found in the Food for Peace Act, P.L. 89-808. In the first place, the entire rationale of the law was changed. Instead of a device to dispose of U.S. agricultural surpluses, the new law advances a program to combat hunger and malnutrition and assist economic development, particularly in those countries that do the most to help themselves. In line with this program, the President is directed, in negotiating and carrying out agreements for the sale of agricultural commodities, whether for dollar credits or foreign currencies, to take account of the efforts of the other countries to meet their problems of food production and population growth. In the Foreign Assistance Act of 1968 one of the purposes for which agreements concerning the use of foreign currencies can be made is that of "*** activities, where participation is voluntary, related to problems of population growth ***. Not less than five (5) percentum of the total sales proceeds received each year shall, if requested by the foreign country, be used for voluntary programs to control population growth." (Emphasis added.) That same law also contained a provision stipulating, as one of the self-help criteria the developing country must meet in order for the President to agree to the sale of agricultural commodities, the criterion of "carrying out voluntary programs to control population growth." This is stronger language than that which would merely take account of LDC efforts at selfhelp.

Thus today the distribution of U.S. foodstuffs abroad under P.L. 480 is definitely linked to action by the receiving country to deal with its population problem. Obviously, this linkage does not apply when there is a natural catastrophe, such as the earthquake in Peru or the floods in East Pakistan. In those instances food is likely to be made available whether or not the stricken country is doing anything to alleviate its population problem.

Otherwise food assistance, if implemented in accordance with the law, will be geared in with total development. Such aid is no longer an outlet for surpluses, but rather a catalyst to induce the developing countries to go forward with their own food production, and to establish and support family planning activities. The food that is shipped no longer has to be in a surplus category. Whether this may simply be a short-term phenomenon, derived from the elimination of U.S. surpluses, or a really long-term trend, remains to be seen. If

U.S. food production generates domestic surpluses once again, the demand for a return to the surplus disposal philosophy could become a very live issue.

Institutional Resources for Orderly Development of Agriculture

The extent to which agricultural policy can be implemented is limited by the nature of agriculture itself-whether in the small farm, managed by a single owner, or the large farm, handled like a substantial business firm. Operating decisions in agriculture are usually an inherent prerogative of land ownership in the non-communist developing countries. This principle limits the scope and effectiveness of national agricultural policy, and complicates the role of international organizations formed to coordinate or promote balance in the development of global or regional agriculture. As Dr. A. H. Boerma, Director General of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), complained, despite a quarter-century of FAO efforts the agricultural scene today was "a very mixed one still containing distortions, imbalances, injustices, and deep unrest."

For what do we have? [Boerma continued] On the other hand, there are vest regions where neither the land nor the waters of the earth are properly cultivated, where the majority of mankind is in one way or another badly fed, where the countryside is inhabited by millions of people living in extreme poverty, and where most of them are unable to find work. On the other hand, there is a smaller part of the earth where it seems that far too much food is being produced, where governments are either actively paying farmers to cultivate less of their land or dispensing huge sums to keep up the prices of their overproduction, and where large numbers of people are dying from diseases at least partly brought on by overeating. Could there be a more illogical pattern than that currently presented by the completely unbalanced situation of world agriculture and food consumption? "

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As a practical matter, the dislocations Boerma referred to are the focus of a considerable organized effort by agricultural institutions at all levels-private, public, instructional, commercial, local, national, regional, and global. At the global level, there is the FAO itself stimulating cooperation, encouraging international participation of nations. in food contribution programs, collecting statistics, disseminating information and training, and setting up global objectives, priorities, and plans.

There is regional cooperation in agriculture through organizations such as the Alliance for Progress, the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, and the United Nations Economic Committee for Asia and the Far East. These generally serve as regional counterparts to FAO. In addition, of course, each country has its own internal organization for agricultural development and stimulation. Although the United States has led in time and volume of agricultural and food aid, most of the developed countries have followed suit in contributing to the agricultural development of the LDCs. The complex U.S. program of agricultural and food assistance involves the Department of State, U.S.A.I.D., the Department of Agriculture, the various congressional appropriations and oversight committees, mon

e2 Addeke H. Boerma, (Director-general of FAO), "Address to the Eighteenth General Conference of the International Federation of Agricultural Producers on the Occasion of its Twenty-fifth Anniversary" (Paris, France, May 14, 1971), page 4.

itoring by the Office of the President, and the less formal assistance of private groups like the Rockefeller Foundation. A vast network of private international organizations has been constructed, to provide assistance in areas such as labor standards, technical information, marketing, credit, and capital.

Despite the great amount of effort, and the multiplicity of agencies, engaged in various parts of the task of encouraging agricultural development in the LDCs, the total result seems disappointing. Boerma observes that "there has not been much meaningful cooperation among countries for the harmonization of national policies or measures affecting agriculture." The Pearson Report finds a similar lack of direction. The international aid system today, with its profusion of bilateral and multilateral agencies, lacks direction and coherence. A serious effort is necessary to coordinate the efforts of multilateral and bilateral aid-givers and those of aid-receivers.63

The Peterson Report, while offering no explicit criticism of things as they are, is suggestive of these dissatisfactions in the recommendations it offers for change (paraphrase):

Private investment is under attack. Enlightened trade policies toward the LDCs are an essential element in achieving international development. Accepting imports is one of the responsibilities of industrial countries. More reliance should be placed on international organizations; an international organization like the World Bank, with no political or commercial interests of its own, is able to obtain good results. Strengthen the capabilities of international organizations and build more coherence into their operations. Encourage them to take a broader view: to give increasing attention to the management, social, technical, scientific cooperation, and popular participation aspects of development. Encourage them to be diplomatic, flexible, sympathetic, and persuasive-but prepared to say no and to withstand political pressure. With respect to U.S. assistance, there is an excessive number of statutory and procedural requirements that encumber the program and reduce its flexibility. A number of departments and agencies have competing interests and responsibilities with the result that too many issues go to the President for resolution, and opportunities to take initiatives in policies toward developing countries are sometimes lost.4

Boerma's analysis suggests the need for a more comprehensive and more vigorous global approach: "The developing world as a whole is in need of help. The developed world as a whole must provide it." Subjects that call for action, he says, are: *** population, employment, agrarian reform, nutrition, research, marketing, credit, agricultural extension, training, and the improved processing of agricultural products ***." The world of agriculture is interconnected, and "the level of national agricultural production in any one trading country automatically affects the siutation in others. *** In the world of today, agricultural policies can no longer be formulated in an exclusively national or even regional or subregional context." Moreover, in dealing with these problems "what is required is in

63 Lester B. Pearson, et al. "Partners in Development, Report of the Commission on International Development" (New York, International Bank for Reconstruction and Development, 1969), page 22,

64 U.S. Foreign Assistance in the 1970's: A New Approach," Report to the President from the Task Force on International Development, March 4, 1970 (Washington, U.S. Government Printing Office, 1970), 39 pages.

creased dynamism ***" 65 All these comments add up to one conclusion: That the diplomatic, economic, political, social, and administrative aspects of the Green Revolution lag behind the technological aspects, and that the problem of orderly agricultural development on a balanced, global basis is far from being solved.

Conflicting Agricultural Plans and Programs

On the one hand it is asserted (by Boerma, for example) that "too little attention is paid to agriculture." Industry has been given priority in the allocation of scarce financial resources. On the other hand, it is suggested that insufficient emphasis on urban industrial opportunity will result in hardship for those released from the new, highly productive agriculture. (Even this conclusion is controversial, in view of the belief held by some analysts that the Green Revolution will cause an increase in agricultural employment. See pages 20-21.)

Boerma calls for more liberal trade policies toward the developing world, a global balance of agricultural supply and demand, more and better international commodity agreements hopefully combined into an integrated scheme for international commodity control-and agreement on guidelines for national agricultural policy as well as on procedures for reviewing their strict application.

One related issue concerns the rate at which the Green Revolution should be pressed. Various observers have pointed out that dissatisfactions and tensions are likely to accompany the Green Revolution in the LDCs, and that if it proceeds rapidly the tensions will be the more severe to the point where actual conflict and revolutionary activity may

occur.

Another issue may be that well-intentioned diplomats and scientists are urging a faster pace of acceptance of new agricultural technology than is warranted by the technology itself. For example, Dr. Borlaug, in describing his program in Mexico, advocated that exploitation begin immediately of the "better" without waiting for the "best."

In Mexico [wrote Dr. Borlaug], as soon as significant improvements were made by research, whether in varieties, fertilizer recommendations, or cultural practices, they were taken to farms and incorporated into the production programs. We never waited for perfection in varieties or methods but used the best available each year and modified them as further improvements came to hand.

66

Yet elsewhere in his report, Dr. Borlaug noted that a variety [IR8] of rice introduced into monsoon areas of India and East Pakistan was not well adapted to climatic conditions there and had had only a "modest and occasional impact."

Dr. Borlaug has also appealed for "the will and commitment of governments to support national production campaigns." It seems evident that when national or even international mobilization of a vigorous administrative and political effort is required, careful attention should be given to the question of whether the technology is sufficiently perfected and properly adapted to local conditions before it is applied.

65 Boerma. "Address to the Eighteenth General Conference of the International Federation of Agricultural Producers op. cit., pages 14-15. Norman E. Borlaug. "The Green Revolution op. cit., page 44.