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The Sarmatian Review Index

January 2002

Volume XXII, No. 1

Demography

Number of Catholics in the United States: 63,683,030.

Source: 2001 Official Catholic Directory, as reported by Houston Chronicle, 16 June 2001.

Percentage of Americans 25 and older that had at least a bachelor's degree in 2000: 25 percent.

Source: New York Times, 6 August 2001.

Number of Russian Orthodox parishes and number of Russian Orthodox worshipers on the territory of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth in 1772: several hundred and 250,000, respectively.

Number of Russian Orthodox parishes and worshipers in the same territory in 1914: 6,000 and 10 million, respectively.

Reasons for change: intensive program of Russification through (not infrequently forced) conversion of people to Russian Orthodoxy.

Source: Piotr Paszkiewicz, W sluzbie imperium rosyjskiego, Warsaw 1999, p. 303.

Postcommunist ecology

Percentage decline in commercial fishing in the Sea of Azov (it drains into the Black Sea) since the 1970s: 97 percent.

Source: Paul Goble, "Another Dead Sea," RFE/RL, 20 June 2001.

Trade

Increase in trade between Russia and the United States in 2000 (since 1999): 3 percent, to more than $7.31 billion.

The structure of Russian exports to the United States (worth $4.63 billion): 80 percent of exports were raw materials and semi-finished goods: precious stones and metals, aluminum and aluminum products, iron and steel, inorganice chemical goods and crude oil and oil products.

Source: Associated Press (Moscow), 15 June 2001.

Keeping up with the world or falling behind?

Number of students from Poland at American universities in 1997, 1999/2000, and 2000/2001: 1707, 1363 (of whom 61.7 percent were undergraduates), and 2432, respectively.

Number of Polish students who took the TOEFL English test in 1999/2000: 1950.

Number of students worldwide who took this test in that year: 317,708.

Source: American Universities Admission Program (AUAP), as of 5 July and 24 November 2001.

Education

Number of pupils in primary and secondary schools in Poland in September 2001: 6.6 million.

Source: Michal Jankowski in Donosy, 4 September 2001.

Pornography and crime

Amount of pornographic materials produced in Moscow each month: two million pornographic video cassettes and 500,000 CDs.

Percentage of child pornography in this material: 10 to 15 percent.

Source: Moscow economic crimes chief Vladimir Tsvetkov and interior ministroy official Yuri Belkin, as reported by AFP, 23 August 2001.

Ranking of the number of murders per 100,000 people in the year 2000: 1. South Africa 2. Russia (22,000 murders committed in the first 8 months of 2001).

Source: General Vladimir Gordiyenko, as reported by AFP, 3 October 2001.

Opinions on death penalty

Percentage of Poles who are in favor of restoring the death penalty: 66 percent.

Percentage of those against: 24 percent.

Among those who are against, percentage of university and high school students is 36 percent, self-declared right-wingers 35 percent, and teenagers 35 percent.

Source: OBOP poll, as reported by Michal Jankowski in Donosy, 23 August 2001.

Economy

Percentage of land in the Russian Federation approved on 20 September 2001 by the Duma for conditional sale to private entities (in spite of strong opposition from those who oppose private ownership of land): 2 percent.

Source: AFP (Moscow), 20 September 2001.

Russian GDP as percentage of world GDP: 1 percent.

Trade with Russia as percentage of world trade: 1 percent.

Source: Marielle Eudes of AFP, 20 September 2001.

Percentage of Poland's GDP produced by farming: 4.8 percent.

Percentage of Poland's population employed in farming: over 20 percent.

Source: AFP, 24 September 2001.

Percentage drop in new foreign direct investment in Poland in the first half of 2001 (as compared to the first half of 2000): 13.6 percent.

Cumulative foreign investment in Poland from 1989 to 30 June 2001: $52.2 billion.

Countries that invested most: France ($8.5 billion), United States (7.5 billion), Germany ($2.3 billion).

Breakdown by region: 68.1 percent from the European Union; 15.9 percent from North America.

Breakdown by branch of economy in which investments were made: industry, 41.8 percent; finance, 23 percent; transport and telecommunications, 1.6 percent.

Source: AFP (Warsaw) 28 September 2001.

Polish elections

Results of the 23 September 2001 elections: the SLD alliance with the Union of Work (UP): 41.4 percent of the vote and 216 seats in the Sejm; center-right Civic Platform (PO): 12.7 percent and 65 seats; Polish Peasant Party (PSL): 8.7 percent and 42 seats; the radical farmers' union Samoobrona: 10.3 percent and 53 seats; Polish Family League: 7.7 percent and 38 seats; Law and Justice Party: 9.79 percent and 44 seats; the German minority 2 (guaranteed) seats.

Source: AFP, 27 September 2001.

Number of seats in the Polish Sejm (lower house): 460.

Number of candidates and parties who competed for these seats during the elections (data from 23 September 2001): 7,800 candidates from 15 parties and coalitions.

Number of seats in the Polish Senate: 100.

Number of candidates who competed for these seats: 430.

Number of Poles of voting age: 29 million.

Source: AFP (Warsaw), 19 September 2001.

Money

Size of Polish M2 money supply in August 2001: 318.45 billion zlotys ($75.26 billion, an increase of 8.2 percent since January 2001). M2 money supply includes banknotes in circulation, term and demand deposits, and savings bonds.

Source: National Bank of Poland, as reported by AFP (Warsaw), 14 September 2001.

Movies

Number of persons who saw Sienkiewicz's Quo Vadis (recently produced by Jerzy Kawalerowicz) during the first weekend (14-15 September 2001) of its screening in theaters: 300,000.

Number of viewers necessary to break even with the production costs of $18 million: 7 million.

Source: Donosy, September 2001.

Russian perceptions of Germans

Percentage of Russians who say they are fond of Germans: 67 percent.

Source: Public Opinion Fund Poll (1,500 people were questioned), as reported by AFP, 21 September 2001.

Catholicism in Kazakhstan

Estimated numbers of Catholics, Eastern Orthodox, and Muslims in Kazakhstan (pop. 15 million: 400,000, 5 million, 7.5 million.

Out of these, percentage of people who actively practice their religion: an estimated 5 percent.

Number of Catholic priests and Catholic parishes in Kazakhstan: 30 priests (mostly Polish-born), 17 parishes and 160 locations where parishes have not yet been established owing to a lack of priests and money.

Source: Stanislaw Zasada, Zycie (Warsaw), 22 September 2001.

Memory

Name of the largest university in the Russian Empire in 1832: the University of Vilnius, founded by the Polish King Stefan Batory in 1587.

Fate of that university: it was liquidated in 1832 as a ‘disseminator of Polishness.'

Source: Piotr Paszkiewicz, W sluzbie imperium rosyjskiego, Warsaw 1999, p. 39.

Title of #1 bestselling book in the United States in 1898: Quo Vadis by Henryk Sienkiewicz.

Source: Rzeczpospolita, 9 September 2001.