Quotes About Borlaug

Some of the environmental lobbyists of the Western nations are the salt of the earth, but many of them are elitists.

I had the privilege of knowing and working with Norman Borlaug - who has been aptly described by the Nobel Peace Prize Committee as the greatest hunger fighter of our time - for nearly 50 years.

Borlaug would be one figure that I think fundamentally changed India, China, all of Southeast Asia, and gave them the time to be able to build on other things.

The parallels between Borlaug and Vogt are inexact. Borlaug never wrote a manifesto and mostly declined the roles of theorist and exponent. Instead he became, by the example of his life, the emblem of a way of thought—the Wizard's way. His success would show, at least to Wizards, that science and technology, properly applied, could allow humankind to produce its way into a prosperous future.

The better way, he decided, was to raise yields all over the nation—to target Mexico as a whole, rather than only the Bajío. As Vietmeyer put it, Borlaug thought the objective should be to "feed everyone; not just the hungry. Opt to feed the whole populace." Produce enough not only to feed every man and woman in Mexico but also to export to other food-short nations.

Borlaug thought, the process would be too slow. As a rule of thumb, wheat breeders needed ten to fifteen harvests to select, test, and propagate a new variety. The process couldn't be hurried; farmers could grow only one crop of winter or spring wheat a year. But the Rockefeller Foundation wasn't going to wait fifteen years. And the farmers needed help now.

Vogt and Borlaug have the same mission: to use the discoveries of modern science to spare Mexico from a future of poverty and environmental degradation. But prospects are unlikely, in Mexico in 1946, for this to happen; indeed, Vogt and Borlaug believe that the situation grows direr by the day.