Renowned agricultural scientist Dr. Norman Borlaug has died at the age of 95. Borlaug, known as the father of the “Green Revolution” for saving over a billion people from starvation by utilizing pioneering high yield farming techniques, is one of only five people in history who has been awarded a Nobel Peace Prize, the Presidential Medal of Freedom, and the Congressional Gold Medal.
For more details on Borlaug’s life and accomplishments see CNN’s report here. Also here is a Gregg Easterbrook article on Borlaug’s life and career.
From the Wikipedia page on Borlaug:
During the mid-20th century, Borlaug led the introduction of these high-yielding varieties combined with modern agricultural production techniques to Mexico, Pakistan, and India. As a result, Mexico became a net exporter of wheat by 1963. Between 1965 and 1970, wheat yields nearly doubled in Pakistan and India, greatly improving the food security in those nations. These collective increases in yield have been labeled the Green Revolution, and Borlaug is often credited with saving over a billion people from starvation. He was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1970 in recognition of his contributions to world peace through increasing food supply.
Later in his life, he helped apply these methods of increasing food production to Asia and Africa. Borlaug continually advocated the use of his methods and biotechnology to decrease world famine. His work faced environmental and socioeconomic criticisms, including charges that his methods have created dependence on monoculture crops, unsustainable farming practices, heavy indebtedness among subsistence farmers, and high levels of cancer among those who work with agriculture chemicals. He emphatically rejected many of these as unfounded or untrue. In 1986, he established the World Food Prize to recognize individuals who have improved the quality, quantity or availability of food around the globe.
Renowned agricultural scientist Dr. Norman Borlaug, known as the father of the “Green Revolution” for saving over a billion people from starvation by utilizing pioneering high yield farming techniques, is one of only five people in history who has been awarded a Nobel Peace Prize, the Presidential Medal of Freedom ,and the Congressional Gold Medal.
Borlaug also declared himself skeptical of man-made climate fears in 2007. “I do believe we are in a period where, no question, the temperatures are going up. But is this a part of another one of those (natural) cycles that have brought on glaciers and caused melting of glaciers?” Borlaug asked, according to a September 21, 2007 article in Saint Paul Pioneer Press. The article reported that Borlaug is “not sure, and he doesn’t think the science is, either.” Borlaug added, “How much would we have to cut back to take the increasing carbon dioxide and methane production to a level so that it’s not a driving force?” We don’t even know how much.”
It is often only when they pass that we realize their contribution to humanity. They stuck to the facts as they were developed and quietly accomplished much.
Dr. Norman Borlaug was one of the principle reasons why Paul Ehrlich and John Holdren’s wildly pessimistic predictions of over-population catastrophy failed to materialise.
What a marvelous GENTLEMAN with great character and accomplishment.
Every time I heard him speak (I live in Minnesota, so I’ve had several opportunities to hear Dr. Borlaug speak in the last 30 odd years.) I have marveled at his straightforward, no nonsense delivery.
Some want to dismiss the 2007 interview as “ramblings of an old man”, but I have it on good authority that he was sharp and with it to the last week of his life.
Goodbye Dr. B ! You will be missed. We hope your STUDENTS carry on.
FORGOTTEN BENEFACTOR OF HUMANITY
The Atlantic Monthly, January 1997
Norman Borlaug, the agronomist whose discoveries sparked the Green Revolution, has saved literally millions of lives, yet he is hardly a household name
by Gregg Easterbrook
Excerpt:
AMERICA has three living winners of the Nobel Peace Prize, two universally renowned and the other so little celebrated that not one person in a hundred would be likely to pick his face out of a police lineup, or even recognize his name. The universally known recipients are Elie Wiesel, who for leading an exemplary life has been justly rewarded with honor and acclaim, and Henry Kissinger, who in the aftermath of his Nobel has realized wealth and prestige. America’s third peace-prize winner, in contrast, has been the subject of little public notice, and has passed up every opportunity to parley his award into riches or personal distinction. And the third winner’s accomplishments, unlike Kissinger’s, are morally unambiguous. Though barely known in the country of his birth, elsewhere in the world Norman Borlaug is widely considered to be among the leading Americans of our age.
Borlaug is an eighty-two-year-old plant breeder who for most of the past five decades has lived in developing nations, teaching the techniques of high-yield agriculture. He received the Nobel in 1970 , primarily for his work in reversing the food shortages that haunted India and Pakistan in the 1960s. Perhaps more than anyone else, Borlaug is responsible for the fact that throughout the postwar era, except in sub-Saharan Africa, global food production has expanded faster than the human population, averting the mass starvations that were widely predicted — for example, in the 1967 best seller Famine — 1975! The form of agriculture that Borlaug preaches may have prevented a billion deaths.
Yet although he has led one of the century’s most accomplished lives, and done so in a meritorious cause, Borlaug has never received much public recognition in the United States, where it is often said that the young lack heroes to look up to. One reason is that Borlaug’s deeds are done in nations remote from the media spotlight: the Western press covers tragedy and strife in poor countries, but has little to say about progress there. Another reason is that Borlaug’s mission — to cause the environment to produce significantly more food — has come to be seen, at least by some securely affluent commentators, as perhaps better left undone. More food sustains human population growth, which they see as antithetical to the natural world.
The Ford and Rockefeller Foundations and the World Bank, once sponsors of his work, have recently given Borlaug the cold shoulder. Funding institutions have also cut support for the International Maize and Wheat Center — located in Mexico and known by its Spanish acronym, CIMMYT — where Borlaug helped to develop the high-yield, low-pesticide dwarf wheat upon which a substantial portion of the world’s population now depends for sustenance. And though Borlaug’s achievements are arguably the greatest that Ford or Rockefeller has ever funded, both foundations have retreated from the last effort of Borlaug’s long life: the attempt to bring high-yield agriculture to Africa.
The African continent is the main place where food production has not kept pace with population growth: its potential for a Malthusian catastrophe is great. Borlaug’s initial efforts in a few African nations have yielded the same rapid increases in food production as did his initial efforts on the Indian subcontinent in the 1960s. Nevertheless, Western environmental groups have campaigned against introducing high-yield farming techniques to Africa, and have persuaded image-sensitive organizations such as the Ford Foundation and the World Bank to steer clear of Borlaug. So far the only prominent support for Borlaug’s Africa project has come from former President Jimmy Carter , a humanist and himself a farmer, and from the late mediagenic multimillionaire Japanese industrialist Ryoichi Sasakawa.
Reflecting Western priorities, the debate about whether high-yield agriculture would be good for Africa is currently phrased mostly in environmental terms, not in terms of saving lives. By producing more food from less land, Borlaug argues, high-yield farming will preserve Africa’s wild habitats, which are now being depleted by slash-and-burn subsistence agriculture. Opponents argue that inorganic fertilizers and controlled irrigation will bring a new environmental stress to the one continent where the chemical-based approach to food production has yet to catch on. In this debate the moral imperative of food for the world’s malnourished — whether they “should” have been born or not, they must eat — stands in danger of being forgotten.
The Mennonites brought wheat from Russia. Many settled in the dry higher elevation southwest of El Paso. It was amazing how they used great farming practices and Borlaug used strong work with hybrids and the area started getting very productive.
I think he also did a lot of work with developing rust ressistant varieties. My relatives are doing well with crops in Mexico and to me It seems as dry as new Mexico.
Far more deserving of a Nobel Peace Prize than “you know who”. Sadly, most of the world (excluding the African people) do not know or understand this man’s contribution to mankind.
I like to think that someday more people will know who Norman Borlaug was than know who Michael Jackson was.
“known as the father of the “Green Revolution” for saving over a billion people from starvation”…
God Bless you Dr. Borlaug.
“Other concerns of his critics and critics of biotechnology in general include: that the construction of roads in populated third-world areas could lead to the destruction of wilderness; the crossing of genetic barriers; the inability of crops to fulfill all nutritional requirements; the decreased biodiversity from planting a small number of varieties; the environmental and economic effects of inorganic fertilizer and pesticides; the amount of herbicide sprayed on fields of herbicide-resistant crops.[27]”
Most “green” extremists have hangups with hybrids and GM seeds as they do with non organic farming.
Borlaug had forrestry experience and knew the hindrances by the sierra club and its contribution to fire risks. The “green” movement also has hindrances to best farming practices except for some states where minumym tillage thrives.
“Production in Africa
In the early 1980s, environmental groups that were opposed to Borlaug’s methods campaigned against his planned expansion of efforts into Africa. They prompted the Rockefeller and Ford Foundations and the World Bank to stop funding most of his African agriculture projects. Western European governments were persuaded to stop supplying fertilizer to Africa. According to David Seckler, former Director General of the International Water Management Institute, “the environmental community in the 1980s went crazy pressuring the donor countries and the big foundations not to support ideas like inorganic fertilizers for Africa.”[21]
In 1984, during the Ethiopian famine, Ryoichi Sasakawa, the chairman of the Japan Shipbuilding Industry Foundation (now the Nippon Foundation), contacted the semi-retired Borlaug, wondering why the methods used in Asia were not extended to Africa, and hoping Borlaug could help. He managed to convince Borlaug to help with this new effort,[30] and subsequently founded the Sasakawa Africa Association (SAA) to coordinate the project.”
wikipedia
Texas A & M is reffered to as soil and crop science. The city slicker “green” know it all wants nothing to do with all aspects of science from fertilizers, insecticides, tillage equipment and irrigation.
If Henry waxman had his way, California would even be a large importer of food.
Sadly, people today barely know this great man’s name. But make no mistake: in 100 years, when children are studying the history of the late 20th century, they WILL learn his name and his accomplishments, and not be distracted by idiot celebrities or politicians whose names will be forgotten.
R.I.P. to a great person. He earned a real Peace prize, from before when it became a PeaCe Price…
If only he had be allowed to save the millions in Africa…
FWIW, “Rice Intensification” also is set to “over double” yields.
Bob Meyer (20:11:35) :
I like to think that someday more people will know who Norman Borlaug was than know who Michael Jackson was.
We know that the intellectual (and ethical) dark ages have begun when people like Al Gore and Michael Jackson are lionized while great men like Norman Borlaug are ignored or forgotten.
Henry chance (20:23:33) : “…Borlaug had forestry experience and knew the hindrances by the sierra club and its contribution to fire risks. The “green” movement also has hindrances to best farming practices except for some states where minim(u)m tillage thrives.”
The so-called “greens” are rapidly being outed as ignorant, egotistical, leftist snobs.
Dr. Borlaug. Not many people knew who he was or of his achievements in humanity, and I am sure that the Malthusians are somewhat upset with him for helping to perpetuate the ‘humanity problem’, but he did the right thing by sharing this technology, with personal risk to himself in India/Pakistan and saving many lives in the process.
A man who did what he did for the people he helped, and not himself. He did not achieve out of a vain desire for glory, and so many don’t know his name. This makes him a real hero in my book. Dr. Borlaug, enjoy your time with the big man upstairs, hope to see you there someday.
Dr. Norman Borlaug, was easily the greatest contributor of good to the entire human race of the twentieth century.
Nothing else to say. P.G.
Anthony et al – thanks for this post.
Moderator please fix spelling of “Agricultural” in title.
Everyone please read the above excerpt that I posted from the January 1997 article in The Atlantic Monthly.
So in addition to the effective banning of DDT, that destroyed the lives of hundreds of millions in Africa due to resurgent malaria, the Green Movement also gets credit for halting the Green Revolution in Africa.
I’m sure I’m not the only one who is outraged by such selfish inhumanity.
Look how the greens oppose now the use of genetic engineered crops today. They want to prevent the 3rd world to increase farming output, but for stupid reasons (they hate multinational food companies like Monsanto). They say that the farmers would get dependent on large companies. Isn’t that the choice of the farmers? I understand that 1st world middle class people can decide to have a “organic” yoghurt in the morning and that they want to spend 50 cents more for that. But it’s totally misantropic to force 3rd world people to adopt their stupid “organic” / “bio” / “natural” weird ideas.
Borlaug was a personal hero of mine. One of the greatest men of the 20th century that nobody knows about. He had the guts to take on the greenies on the beneficial uses of DDT.
If y’all want to see a real “hockey stick,” plot those crop yields against the CO2 curve. Illinois corn going back to 1865 comes pretty close, especially if you throw out the crop failure years, which are usually caused by abnormal rain patterns.
http://i29.tinypic.com/120ilbc.jpg
That guy probably saved more lives than Pasteur…
Does anybody have a link to the 2007 Saint Paul Pioneer Press paper?
The Greens are blaming him for helping cause Global Warming.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/guest_contributors/article6833080.ece
And the general tone of the comments is, who cares if he saved a billion people from starvation, they are all going to die from the coming environmental disaster that was his fault when, the world overheats, we run out of oil, there’s no topsoil left, we eat too much meat, (choose your preferred enviro-disaster).
“Borlaug, known as the father of the “Green Revolution” for saving over a billion people from starvation by utilizing pioneering high yield farming techniques. . .”
That is probably why he is reviled by the Malthusians (falsified their prophecies) and by the Eco nuts (allowed too many humans to live).
Technology can and does save lives.
So passes the man who fed the world. His greatness silenced the cries of hunger. Truly a giant.
Here is a special report from national geographic on the future of food supply.
http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2009/06/cheap-food/bourne-text
Whatever the future brings we need people like Norman Borlaug.
Not to take away from the accomplishments of Dr. Borlaug, but another significant agricultural advance was the Haber-Bosch process developed early in the 20th century. For those who may not know, the process now produces 100 million tons of nitrogen fertilizer per year, derived from natural gas. That fertilizer is responsible for sustaining one-third of the Earth’s population.
Those who advocate a return to “Traditional” agriculture (crapping on the fields, localization farming using animals and people instead of modern equipment made possible by fossil fuels, etc. ) would be condemning billions to starvation and/or slavery. Which, sadly, often seems to be their goal.
A single combine replaces the combined labor of hundreds of slaves wielding scythes.
Too bad much of the increase in food production for Mexico has been diverted into ethanol alcohol for fuel.
Allan M R MacRae (23:11:51) :
Rachel Carson got the science wrong, I think intentionally. Silent Spring still sells over a hundred copies a week at Amazon. This book led to the formation of EPA where other outrages continue to this day.
Fallacies of DDT ban well documented in Kicking the Sacred Cow: Heresy and Impermissible Thoughts in Science.
Poor Africa. Was victimized by vicious imperial masters, now victimized by various do-gooders.
WattsUp should do a blog. Standing up for science and calling for the unbanning of DDT.
Kojiro Vance (23:16:52) :
“Borlaug was a personal hero of mine. One of the greatest men of the 20th century that nobody knows about. He had the guts to take on the greenies on the beneficial uses of DDT.”-excellent.
RIP Mr. Borlaug, you fought the good fight,nothing terrifies the Greenies more than
healthy, prosperous, dark skinned people…
I can say this because of my own background…
Jack, you’ve got it wrong. Mexico doesn’t allow the growing of Genetically Modified Corn. As a result, their corn farmers can’t compete with U.S. farmers.
They Import Field Corn from the U.S. (mostly to be used for cattle feed.) They are, also, our biggest Export market for DDGS.
I am glad to see the environmentalists applaud his work. Part of the applause comes from the fact he didn’t reside and do most of his work in America and the other part comes from his liberal Rockefeller name backing him.
The environmentalist sure battled him and many of his approaches. They still do today. The extreme hostility in his work for Africa is the example. I still remember watching farmers in mexico work the fields with oxen and my relatives had new John Deere tractors. My relatives bought john Deeres from Germany because they had less duty on them. They also went with steel wheels instead of rubber tires because they were 50 miles from cities having lousy tire shops.
“For those who may not know, the process now produces 100 million tons of nitrogen fertilizer per year, derived from natural gas. That fertilizer is responsible for sustaining one-third of the Earth’s population.”
Posted by “Curiousgeorge”
At least anecdotally, I can say that the environmentalists do not like nitrogen either, because local gardening shows are beginning to frown on its use, saying these types of fertilizers have “salts that harm the soil.”
Many may not have cared for the WOT, but now we have exchanged it for the War on the Economy (Cap and Trade), and it seems, the War on the Elements–including Carbon and Nitrogen! Rediculous!
dorlomin (07:00:59) :
WattsUp should do a blog. Standing up for science and calling for the unbanning of DDT.
I vote for it.
@ Zeke the Sneak (09:24:27) : Wait till they find out that Sulfur is required to grow corn and other crops! That will really freak them out!
Right! And that nasty Chlorine for treating water and used in our refrigerants, that must go.
——
By the way, on the subject of Wars on the Economy and the Wars on the Elements, there is one more: the War on Energy:
1. http://green.autoblog.com/2009/05/08/obama-doe-slash-hydrogen-fuel-cell-funding-in-new-budget
2. aren’t they trying to tie up BlackLight power in patent red tape, also?
3. They never liked cold fusion, either
There, WOE WOE WOE, the third WOE is upon us.
Way to rip off my Wikipedia article and my graph without any credit or reference to GFDL.
REPLY: Thanks for the reminder, I did indeed miss putting in the reference to the Wikipedia page on Borlaug. I’ve fixed that. I got distracted in the middle of editing last night by an issue with one of my employees that needed help, and forgot to come back to editing it this AM.
The graphic is listed as having a “public doman” license by Wikipedia which you can clearly see here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Wheat_yields_in_selected_countries,_1951-2004.png
It says: ” I grant any entity the right to use this work for any purpose, without any conditions, unless such conditions are required by law.” and there are no requirements listed for attribution.
Even though I’m not required to do so, if you’d like to provide your full name, I’ll be happy to attribute it to you. – Anthony
Kum Dollison (07:12:50) :
Jack, you’ve got it wrong. Mexico doesn’t allow the growing of Genetically Modified Corn. As a result, their corn farmers can’t compete with U.S. farmers.
I don’t believe U.S. corn qualifies as Genetically Modified, in the European Luddite/Golden Rice/Monsanto sense of the phrase. Our corn’s inherent vigor is the result of intensive hybridization, the crossing of two parent strains to produce a strain that is more productive than either parent. The crossing is done nature’s way, wind-blown pollen from one parent landing on the ears of the de-tasseled other parent.
What keeps the seed companies in business is the fact that the crossing must be done every year. If the resulting crossed grain is used for seed, the yield is much lower.
When I was a kid in Illinois, 100 bu/acre was a super good year. Now the average is around 160, and the farmers going all out for bragging rights get up near 300 bu/acre.
.
dorlomin should do a blog. Standing up for science and calling for the unbanning of DDT.
Lets look at the Nobel Peace price then and now. Norman Borlaug kept a low profile working effective solutions and saved a billion people’s lives. Al Gore is the highest profile environmentalist of this century and stands to make a billion bucks. Guess which one is my hero?
“Whoever makes two ears of corn, or two blades of grass to grow where only one grew before, deserves better of mankind, and does more essential service to his country than the whole race of politicians put together”
Jonathan Swift
I don’t think there is a better epitaph for Norman Borlaug than that – it is the one I will always think of when I remember him.
Sean: “Guess which one is my hero?”
oooh oooh, I know this one! pick me! 😉
Penn and teller recognized his importance:
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dPosEhkx5vI&color1=0xb1b1b1&color2=0xcfcfcf&hl=en&feature=player_embedded&fs=1]
The reason he is not a household name is because he was outstanding in his field. (pun intended)
He hurried out to the fields and avoided many publicity stunts the urban psuedo scientists are noted for.
In ranching Gore would be known as a rancher that is all hat and no cattle.
From the speech Borlaug gave on The Green Revolution and its implications for humanity when he accepted the Nobel Peace Prize:
http://www.theatlantic.com/issues/97jan/borlaug/speech.htm
Until a few days ago, I had never heard of Dr. Norman Borlaug. I regret that.
As for accusations of causing cancers from working with agricultural chemicals; it is likely that the people affected just didn’t live long enough to get cancer prior to his intervention.
Flanagan (01:37:40) :
I rarely agree with you but on this one I’m with you 100%.
DaveE.
I want to share some temp. facts with WUWT readers regarding agriculture. Hope you guys don’t mind. From 8/1/9 to 9/7/9, the U.S. grain belt has been down right chilly. A third of the U.S. (in no particular order), SD, NE, KS, OK, MN, IA, MO, AR, LA, WI, IL, IN, KY, TN, AL. & MS, recorded only 15 hi temp records and 648 low temp records during that period. Another 10 states: ND, OH, MI, MT, CO, NM, AK, HI, GA, & NC recorded more low temp records than high temp records. The US as a whole recorded 1337 low temps and only 1111 high temps . Since Aug 1st ! ( I used extremeweatherreport.com as my data source.) I don’t think I have to remind anyone that cooler temps are not going to help us with our agriculture. I believe this kind of information is truly being overlooked by our politicians because of the current cap and trade talks on ‘The Hill’. Let’s all chip in and remind them shall we.
My apologies about the link regarding my data source. Its extremeweatherrecords.com . Its late and I’m tired. I’m on the road traveling as well and I’m trying to blog from my phone. But the data is correct if you like to check. I have also been trying to correlate this trend with weather anomalies dating back to late May early June temps that originated back in the Northeastern states. Because it seems to me that a super cool wave that was effecting Chicago and N.Y.C. back in June and July has been working its way Southwest since then. If the data is broken up into 10 day segments, starting with late May as a starting point, cooling temperatures have been moving West by Southwest for about 10 10-day segments, bringing with it precipitation and low lying cloud cover. Now here is where I break from facts and speculate somewhat, seeing as how I need to research more. Its my understanding that as the Sun slumbers, CGR’s penetrate the Earths polar regions more easily. with these over abundant particles entering the atmosphere, possibly causing NLC’s at one level and also disturbing the lower troposphere at higher latitudes. I would truly like to see someone gifted with more knowledge than myself handle this endeavor, because frankly, I think I’m out of my league here. But I do think there is a relationship between this current cool wave that the US and quite possibly other parts of the world may be experiencing. CGR ionization of the upper atmospher, nearer the poles, and drifting southerly and at increasing lower altitudes through its progression around the globe may explain this cooling phenomena. -David Alan-
Borlaug’s birthday (March 25) should be celebrated as the REAL Earth Day.
Kum Dollison (07:12:50) :
Many of the gains won in the fields by the farmers of Mexico were lost in the trading pits of the US when the subsidized alcohol producers pushed aside the food processors for the corn.
This led to increases in the price of corn (good for corn growers in US) and food riots in Mexico as corn goes into the production of tortillas, a staple in the Mexican diet.
It doesn’t matter what is being used in Mexico to grow food, our government’s artificial interference in the markets more than offsets any gains for common people with improved farming methods.
Imagine the fun we will see throughout the world if cap and trade on carbon takes hold. Trading systems set up by the likes of Enron will enrich some paper pushers, like Al Gore and friends, and transform poor people into even poorer people, like Mexican householders.
You can’t grow food for hungry people without energy. By skimming some money on every energy transaction involving fossil fuel, fat cats who have gamed the system will thrive. Yes, it will make things a little harder for the middle class of the US with higher gasoline and utilities bills. It could mean actual starvation for the world’s poor.
Environmentalists don’t really like people anyway, so maybe that was the goal all along.
Ironic is it not; green environmentalists teaming up with capitalists and contrived trading schemes.
Brian0918 (12:03:50) :
Brian,
Correct me if I’m wrong. Isn’t the whole idea of Wikipedia to tap into the resources of millions of volunteers sharing their knowledge and expertise for free and without any of the encumbrances imposed by commercially produced encyclopedias? Your complaint sounds as if you were expecting some sort of payment. Perhaps not mammon but another coin of the human realm, recognition and praise?
Norman Borlaug apparently desired neither.
So we have people from Wikipedia reading WUWT. Here there are real exchanges, some quite heated, over issues. And all is openly debated, as long as people keep it relatively civil.
Not so at Wikipedia. Certain thoughts are not permitted.