*EPF212 10/12/2004
Byliner: World Food Prize Foundation Chief on History of Award
(October 14 ceremony to honor 2004 winners) (1490)

(This article by Kenneth M. Quinn, former U.S. ambassador to Cambodia and president of the World Food Prize Foundation, was written for the State Department's Bureau of International Information Programs. There are no republication restrictions.)

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A foreign visitor recently asked, "What exactly is the World Food Prize?"

I usually respond to such inquiries by quoting the President of the Federal Republic of Germany, Dr. Johannes Rau, who called the World Food Prize "The Nobel Prize for Food and Agriculture."

The longer answer is that The World Food Prize is a $250,000 annual award presented each October in Des Moines, Iowa (in the central part of the United States) to inspire and recognize exceptional breakthrough achievements in increasing the quality, quantity or availability of food around the globe. In past years, World Food Prize Laureates have come from Bangladesh, China, Cuba, Denmark, India, Mexico, Sierra Leone, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, the United States, and the United Nations.

To fully understand the origins of the World Food Prize and how such an international award ended up in Des Moines, Iowa, it is important to know something about the individual whose vision inspired the creation of The Prize -- Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Dr. Norman E. Borlaug.

Norman Borlaug was born on March 25, 1914 in the small farming community of Cresco, located in the northeastern part of Iowa. Young Norm Borlaug saved money by working for fifty cents [or when he was lucky a dollar] a day during the Great Depression. Eventually he saved enough money to be able to attend the University of Minnesota where he earned a Ph.D. degree in plant pathology. In 1944, he traveled to Mexico to work at what was then a small rural agricultural research project, but which would one day become the famed International Center for the Improvement of Wheat and Maize.

For the next 20 years Borlaug worked closely with poor Mexican farmers to develop a hybrid variety of wheat that could resist disease and double or triple its yields. His eureka moment came in the early 1960s with the development of a new strain that could do just that, greatly increasing the wheat harvest and lifting Mexican farmers out of subsistence agriculture and poverty.

The United Nations then asked Dr. Borlaug to go to South Asia where India and Pakistan were both on the verge of massive famine. Working closely, and on a basis of equality, with bright young Indian and Pakistani scientists, Borlaug and his team succeeded in convincing the leadership of both countries to radically alter their approach to agriculture. The result was that both nations went from food deficits to surpluses in a few short years, saving hundreds of millions of people from starvation and death.

Borlaug's approach to wheat spread to the west through Afghanistan, Iran, Iraq, Jordan and Egypt, aiding all of those countries in meeting their food requirements and affecting millions more. To the east, Borlaug's lessons were adapted to rice and soon scientists at the International Rice Research Institute in the Philippines were producing "miracle rice" varieties such as IR-8, which gave farmers throughout Southeast Asia bumper crops of rice and a new surplus to uplift the lives of their families.

For these achievements, Borlaug was called the "Father of the Green Revolution," and in 1970, he traveled to Oslo to receive the Nobel Peace Prize for " providing bread for a hungry world." Since then he has worked extensively in Africa as president of Sasakawa Global 2000 to bring the green revolution to that continent which suffers a disproportionate share of world hunger.

In accepting the Nobel Prize, Borlaug expressed the view that there were many other highly deserving scientists around the globe who should be similarly honored for their work to increase the world's food supply.

Borlaug then approached the Nobel Committee in Stockholm to ask that a new Nobel award be established specifically to recognize achievements in the area of food and agriculture. He was disappointed when told by the Nobel representatives that unfortunately the restrictions of Alfred Nobel's will did not permit such a possibility.

Norman Borlaug then turned his efforts toward creating a new honor that could be seen as the equivalent of a Nobel Prize for food. With the support the General Foods Corporation of New York, the World Food Prize was established in 1986, and one year later, the first World Food Prize was presented to Dr. M.S. Swaminathan of India for his work in propagating the green revolution in his home country. The award ceremony took place in Washington, D.C., and was accompanied by a symposium held at the Smithsonian Institute.

Due to a corporate restructuring in 1990, the sponsorship of the World Food Prize was dropped and it appeared that Norman Borlaug's dream was about to go out of existence. At that point, he returned to his home state of Iowa where he met John Ruan, who, like Borlaug, had been born in a small Iowa town in 1914, and in a classic American success story, had turned a one-truck gravel hauling operation into a trucking empire with more than 20,000 trucks. After meeting Borlaug, Ruan immediately assumed financial responsibility for The Prize and moved the Foundation to Des Moines where it has existed ever since. Membership on the Council of Advisors of the Prize has included former U.S. presidents Jimmy Carter and George H.W. Bush and Nigeria's President Olesegun Obasanjo.

Each October, on or near United Nations World Food Day (October 16), a World Food Prize Harvest Celebration is held across the state of Iowa to bring attention to the issues of global food security and Iowa's rich heritage in helping feed the world. The centerpiece of this celebration is the World Food Prize International Symposium, Laureate Ceremony and Global Youth Institute. Even though he turned 90 years of age on March 25 of 2004, Norman Borlaug is at the center of all three events creating what is arguably one of the most significant celebrations of United Nations World Food Day anywhere around the world.

The World Food Prize International Symposium draws over 800 participants to Des Moines each year from more than 40 countries and across the United States. Topics for recent Symposia have included:

-- The Role of Genetically Modified Foods in Feeding the Developing World -- 2000

-- Risks to the World Food Supply, Including Bioterrorism and Agroterrorism -- 2001

-- Global Water Insecurity - 2002

-- Building Alliances to Defeat Hunger as Part of the U.N. Millennium Development Plan -- 2003

In 2004, the World Food Prize International Symposium topic will be "From Asia to Africa: Rice, Biofortification and Enhanced Nutrition."

As Ambassador Jacques Diouf, the Executive Director of the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization, was recently told by a member of the World Food Prize Council of Advisors, this symposium is intended to be a central element of the year-long United Nations celebration of the International Year of Rice.

This emphasis on the Year of Rice was given even greater impetus by the announcement on March 29th at a ceremony at the State Department in Washington, hosted by Secretary of State Colin Powell, that the winners of the 2004 World Food Prize are two exceptional scientists and rice breeders: Professor Yuan Longping of China and Dr. Monty Jones of Sierra Leone. Both men will receive their share of the $250,000 Prize at a ceremony in the beautiful Iowa State Capitol Building in Des Moines on October 14. Information about attending the World Food Prize events or nominating someone for the Prize can be found at www.worldfoodprize.org.

Other Laureates in recent years have included Catherine Bertini Executive Director of the U.N. World Food Programme in 2003, Cuban born Dr. Pedro Sanchez in 2002, Dr. Per Pinstrup-Anderson of Denmark in 2001 and Dr. Evangelina Villegas of Mexico and Dr. Surinder Vasal of India in 2000.

Dr. Borlaug's dream of a global award to honor those individuals who are leading the struggle to end hunger, malnutrition and famine thus remains a reality. It was therefore, a most stirring moment when, at the conclusion of the March 29th State Department ceremony, that Secretary Powell led the Diplomatic Corps in singing Happy Birthday to Dr. Borlaug while a cake with 90 candles ablaze was brought forward for him.

As Dr. Borlaug blew out the candles, following tradition, he may have made a wish. If he did, almost certainly his wish would be, like the main goal of his life, a hope that hunger can be ended and that all on our planet will have enough nutritious food to maintain health and life. It was to achieve this goal, that the World Food Prize was created.

(This byliner was written for the State Department's Bureau of International Information Programs.)

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(Distributed by the Bureau of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: http://usinfo.state.gov)

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