The Dr Borlaug I Knew
By Devinder Sharma
Sharma's ZSpace Page: Oct 18, 2009
The late agronomist Norman Borlaug, regarded as the father of the "Green
Revolution", is credited with saving millions from starvation. Despite the
criticisms of environmentalists, Borlaug had a strong appreciation for the
centrality of farmers' livelihoods in maintaining food security, writes
Devinder Sharma.
It was the discovery of a stocky Japanese wheat variety Norin-10 that the US
military advisor, Dr D. C. Salmon, sent back home in the early 1960's that
changed the face of global agriculture. This was the variety, the only known
semi-dwarf traditional wheat strain, that the late Dr Norman Borlaug was
keenly looking for. Crossed with the rust-resistant varieties that Borlaug
had developed at the International Centre for Wheat and Maize Research
(CIMMYT) in Mexico, the world got the miracle improved varieties that made
history.
These semi-dwarf plants developed by Dr Borlaug responded to the application
of chemical fertilisers and produced a bountiful grain harvest. The yields
multiplied under favourable conditions, and Borlaug knew that the best place
to apply the new technology was obviously India, with the largest population
of hungry in the world. "I tried my best to convince the Indian politicians
about the utility of these semi-dwarf varieties in fighting hunger, but they
were not interested," he once told me. Although the agricultural scientists,
by and large, were convinced about the yield potential of these varieties,
the politicians were not.
"When I didn't see much headway being made, I played the political card
knowing the political rivalry between India and Pakistan," he went on to
explain. "I told India that if you don't want these varieties, I will give
them instead to Pakistan." I am not sure whether it was because of the
political astuteness of Dr Borlaug or the domestic necessity, but India
imported 18,000 tonnes of wheat seed of the semi-dwarf varieties in 1966.
Within a few weeks of the import, the seed was made available in 5 kg packs
and distributed widely in the areas where irrigation was abundant.
The rest is history. India emerged out of its 'ship-to-mouth' existence.
Although hunger still prevails, famine certainly has become history.
For several years after the Green Revolution was launched, I had the
pleasure of accompanying Dr Borlaugh on his annual visits to the Punjab
Agricultural University in Ludhiana. As a young journalist I was always in
awe of Dr Borlaug, and found him to be a simple and dedicated scientist. He
would spend hours under the scorching sun in wheat research fields and was
always keen to visit farmers. On one such evening at a farmer's house, I
remember the host saying; "The three major inputs for raising wheat yields
are: farmers, improved seed and Borlaug."
Walking along the sprawling wheat fields in Ludhiana, I once asked him once:
"What is your biggest achievement. I mean what you would like to be
remembered for." I thought he would say that he wanted to be recalled for
his contribution to plant sciences and fighting global hunger. But in all
humility, Dr Borlaug replied: "I want to be remembered as someone who
introduced baseball in Mexico." And when I burst out laughing, Dr Borlaug
gave me a detailed account of how he actually spent hours playing and
promoting baseball.
The Green Revolution subsequently spread to parts of Asia and Latin America.
It did enable a number of developing countries to emerge out of the hunger
trap. Agricultural scientists promoted the technology worldwide -
cultivating the water guzzling high-yielding varieties of wheat (the same
technology was subsequently applied to rice), applying chemical fertilisers
and pesticides - and they were never able to understand why the
environmentalists were opposed to the technology.
Such was the blind faith in the new technology that Borlaug developed and
promoted that agricultural scientists refused to see the flip side which was
clearly evident through the deterioration of the plant ecology and the
destruction to the environment. Several years after Rachel Carson published
her historic work The Silent Spring, I asked Borlaug whether he had read the
book: "She is an evil force," he reacted angrily, adding: "These are the
people who do not want to eradicate hunger." I didn't agree with him, and
asked him why agricultural scientists can't accept that chemical pesticides
simply kill. "You too, Sharma," he quipped, and then replied: "Remember,
pesticides are like medicines. They have to be applied carefully and
safely."
Dr Borlaug remained committed to his belief in the indispensable role of
chemical fertiliser and pesticides. He was so adamant that when the Third
World Academy in Italy presented a paper on how Brazil had achieved
remarkable crop yields in soybean and sugarcane without applying chemical
nitrogen, he didn't agree. It was only after he travelled to Brazil and saw
for himself these crop yield results that he at least acknowledged the
reality. But even then, he wouldn't accept a vision of agriculture without
chemical fertilisers and pesticides. Such was his blind faith in plant
breeding that initially he even rejected biotechnology, saying it was a
"waste of time."
He would often tell me that if India had not followed the Green Revolution
technology, the country would have needed to bring an additional 58 million
hectares under cultivation to produce the same quantity of food that was
being produced after the high-yielding varieties of wheat were introduced.
My counter argument to this was that although the country saved 58 million
hectares only 40 years after Green Revolution, more than double -- close to
120 million hectares -- are faced with varying degrees of degradation.
Borlaug never pardoned me for espousing the cause of long-term
sustainability in agriculture. He never accepted that the world could
produce enough food with Low-external Input Sustainable Agriculture (LEISA)
techniques. In fact, knowingly or unknowingly he did espouse the trend of
increasing corporate control of agriculture.
Although the Green Revolution did bypass small farmers, Borlaug knew and
appreciated the role farmers played in producing food. The world may not
know that it was for the sake of farmers that he once decried a Nobel prize
for Poland's popular leader, Lech Walesa. At a time when Lech Walesa had
emerged as the leader of the Solidarity Movement in Poland, the Nobel Prize
committee constituted a small team to go and find out whether Walesa
deserved a prize.
The team was headed by Dr Borlaug.
Upon return, he told me how appalled he was to learn that Walesa was only
talking about cheaper food for the industrial workers. Walesa was not
bothered by nor did he care to know what would happen to the livelihoods of
millions of farmers who were producing food for the industrial workers. "My
report therefore categorically ruled out a Nobel for Walesa," said Borlaugh.
It is another matter, however, that Walesa did in fact receive a Nobel Peace
prize.
"Be warned, Sharma," Borlaugh told me during one of his visits to Pantnagar
University, situated at the foot of the Himalayas in Uttarakhand, North
India. "When people stop talking about farmers, when people fail to
recognise their role in feeding the country, you can be sure there is
something terribly wrong happening in agriculture." These prophetic words
hold true today. In India, farmers have long disappeared from the economic
radar screen of the country, and it causes little dismay when farmers commit
suicide or abandon their livelihoods. It is a clear pointer to the terrible
agrarian crisis that continues to prevail.
________________________________________
Devinder Sharma is a New Delhi-based food and trade policy analyst. He is a
regular contributor to STWR and can be reached at hunger55@gmail.com
Norman Ernest Borlaug, agriculture scientist,
born March 25 1914; died 12 September 2009
Source: Share The World's Resources (STWR)
From: Z Net - The Spirit Of Resistance Lives
http://www.zcommunications.org/zspace/commentaries/4017
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