1

Forgotten Benefactor of Humanity

by Gregg Easterbrook
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 li ely to pic his face out of a police lineup, or even recognize his na!e" #he universally nown recipients are Elie $iesel, who for leading an e%e!plary life has been &ustly rewarded with honor and acclai!, and 'enry (issinger, who in the after!ath of his Nobel has realized wealth and prestige" A!erica)s third peace*prize winner, in contrast, has been the sub&ect of little public notice, and has passed up every opportunity to parley his award into riches or personal distinction" And the third winner)s acco!plish!ents, unli e (issinger)s, are !orally una!biguous" #hough barely nown in the country of his birth, elsewhere in the world Nor!an +orlaug is widely considered to be a!ong the leading A!ericans of our age" +orlaug is an eighty*two*year*old plant breeder who for !ost of the past five decades has lived in developing nations, teaching the techni,ues of high*yield agriculture" 'e received the Nobel in -./0, pri!arily for his wor in reversing the food shortages that haunted India and Pa istan in the -.10s" Perhaps !ore than anyone else, +orlaug is responsible for the fact that throughout the postwar era, e%cept in sub*2aharan Africa, global food production has e%panded faster than the hu!an population, averting the !ass starvations that were widely predicted ** for e%a!ple, in the -.1/ best seller Famine -- 1975! #he for! of agriculture that +orlaug preaches !ay have prevented a billion deaths" 3et although he has led one of the century)s !ost acco!plished lives, and done so in a !eritorious cause, +orlaug has never received !uch public recognition in the 4nited 2tates, where it is often said that the young lac heroes to loo up to" 5ne reason is that +orlaug)s deeds are done in nations re!ote fro! the !edia spotlight6 the $estern press covers tragedy and strife in poor countries, but has little to say about progress there" Another reason is that +orlaug)s !ission ** to cause the environ!ent to produce significantly !ore food ** has co!e to be seen, at least by so!e securely affluent co!!entators, as perhaps better left undone" More food sustains hu!an population growth, which they see as antithetical to the natural world" #he 7ord and Roc efeller 7oundations and the $orld +an , once sponsors of his wor , have recently given +orlaug the cold shoulder" 7unding institutions have also cut support for the International Maize and $heat Center ** located in Me%ico and nown by its 2panish acrony!, CIMM3# ** where +orlaug 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 +orlaug)s achieve!ents are arguably the greatest that 7ord or Roc efeller has ever funded, both foundations have retreated fro! the last effort of +orlaug)s long life6 the atte!pt to bring high* yield agriculture to Africa" #he African continent is the !ain place where food production has not ept pace with population growth6 its potential for a Malthusian catastrophe is great" +orlaug)s initial efforts in a few

African nations have yielded the sa!e rapid increases in food production as did his initial efforts on the Indian subcontinent in the -.10s" Nevertheless, $estern environ!ental groups have ca!paigned against introducing high*yield far!ing techni,ues to Africa, and have persuaded i!age*sensitive organizations such as the 7ord 7oundation and the $orld +an to steer clear of +orlaug" 2o far the only pro!inent support for +orlaug)s Africa pro&ect has co!e fro! for!er President 8i!!y Carter, a hu!anist and hi!self a far!er, and fro! the late !ediagenic !ulti!illionaire 8apanese industrialist Ryoichi 2asa awa" Reflecting $estern priorities, the debate about whether high*yield agriculture would be good for Africa is currently phrased !ostly in environ!ental ter!s, not in ter!s of saving lives" +y producing !ore food fro! less land, +orlaug argues, high*yield far!ing will preserve Africa)s wild habitats, which are now being depleted by slash*and*burn subsistence agriculture" 5pponents argue that inorganic fertilizers and controlled irrigation will bring a new environ!ental stress to the one continent where the che!ical*based approach to food production has yet to catch on" In this debate the !oral i!perative of food for the world)s !alnourished ** whether they 9should9 have been born or not, they !ust eat ** stands in danger of being forgotten"

THE LESSON OF THE DUST BOWL N5RMAN +5R:A4; was born in Cresco, Iowa, in -.-<" Ideas being tested in Iowa around the ti!e of his boyhood would soon transfor! the A!erican Midwest into 9the world)s breadbas et,9 not only annually increasing total production ** so !ethodically that the increases were soon ta en for granted ** but annually i!proving yield, growing !ore bushels of grain fro! the sa!e a!ount of land or less" 7ro! about -.=0 until the -.>0s !idwestern far!ers i!proved yields by around three percent a year, !ore than doubling the overall yield through the period" #his feat of e%pansion was so spectacular that so!e pessi!ists declared it was a special case that could never be repeated" +ut it has been done again, since around -./0, in China" Entering college as the ?epression began, +orlaug wor ed for a ti!e in the Northeastern 7orestry 2ervice, often with !en fro! the Civilian Conservation Corps, occasionally dropping out of school to earn !oney to finish his degree in forest !anage!ent" 'e passed the civil* service e%a! and was accepted into the 7orest 2ervice, but the &ob fell through" 'e then began to pursue a graduate degree in plant pathology" ?uring his studies he did a research pro&ect on the !ove!ent of spores of rust, a class of fungus that plagues !any crops" #he pro&ect, underta en when the e%istence of the &et strea! was not yet nown, established that rust*spore clouds !ove internationally in sync with harvest cycles ** a surprising finding at the ti!e" #he process opened +orlaug)s eyes to the !agnitude of the world beyond Iowa)s borders" At the sa!e ti!e, the Midwest was beco!ing the ?ust +owl" #hough so!e !ythology now attributes the ?ust +owl to a conversion to technological far!ing !ethods, in +orlaug)s !ind the proble! was the lac of such !ethods" 2ince then A!erican far!ing has beco!e far !ore technological, and no ?ust +owl conditions have recurrred" In the su!!er of -.>> the ?a otas

had a drought as bad as that in the ?ust +owl, but clouds of soil were rare because few crops failed" +orlaug was horrified by the ?ust +owl and si!ultaneously i!pressed that its effects see!ed least where high*yield approaches to far!ing were being tried" 'e decided that his life)s wor would be to spread the benefits of high*yield far!ing to the !any nations where crop failures as awful as those in the ?ust +owl were regular facts of life" In -.<@ the Roc efeller 7oundation established the precursor to CIMM3# to assist the poor far!ers of Me%ico, doing so at the behest of the for!er 2ecretary of Agriculture 'enry $allace, of the Pioneer 'i*+red seed co!pany fa!ily, who had been unable to e%tract any !oney fro! Congress for agricultural aid to Me%ico" 2oon +orlaug was in Me%ico as the director of the wheat progra! ** a &ob for which there was little co!petition, bac water Me%ico in the -.<0s not being an eagerly sought*after posting" E%cept for brief intervals, he has lived in the developing world since" #he progra!)s initial goal was to teach Me%ican far!ers new far!ing ideas, but +orlaug soon had the institution see ing agricultural innovations" 5ne was 9shuttle breeding,9 a techni,ue for speeding up the !ove!ent of disease i!!unity between strains of crops" +orlaug also developed cereals that were insensitive to the nu!ber of hours of light in a day, and could therefore be grown in !any cli!ates" +orlaug)s leading research achieve!ent was to hasten the perfection of dwarf spring wheat" #hough it is conventionally assu!ed that far!ers want a tall, i!pressive*loo ing harvest, in fact shrin ing wheat and other crops has often proved beneficial" +red for short stal s, plants e%pend less energy on growing inedible colu!n sections and !ore on growing valuable grain" 2tout, short*stal ed wheat also neatly supports its ernels, whereas tall*stal ed wheat !ay bend over at !aturity, co!plicating reaping" Nature has favored genes for tall stal s, because in nature plants !ust co!pete for access to sunlight" In high*yield agriculture e,ually short*stal ed plants will receive e,ual sunlight" As +orlaug labored to perfect his wheat, researchers were see ing dwarf strains of rice at the International Rice Research Institute, in the Philippines, another of the 7ord and Roc efeller 7oundations) creations, and at China)s 'unan Rice Research Institute" 5nce the Roc efeller)s Me%ican progra! was producing high*yield dwarf wheat for Me%ico, +orlaug began to argue that India and other nations should switch to cereal crops" #he proposition was controversial then and re!ains so today, so!e environ!ental co!!entators asserting that far!ers in the developing world should grow indigenous crops Alentils in India, cassava in AfricaB rather than the grains favored in the $est" +orlaug)s argu!ent was si!ply that since no one had yet perfected high*yield strains of indigenous plants Ahigh*yield cassava has only recently been availableB, CIMM3# wheat would produce the !ost food calories for the developing world" +orlaug particularly favored wheat because it grows in nearly all environ!ents and re,uires relatively little pesticide, having an innate resistance to insects" CIMM3#)s selectively bred wheat, no longer a wholly natural plant, would not prosper without fertilizer and irrigation, however" 'igh*yield crops sprout with great enthusias!, but the better plants grow, the !ore !oisture they de!and and the faster they deplete soil nutrients" :i e !ost agrono!ists, +orlaug has always advocated using organic fertilizers ** usually !anure ** to restore soil nutrients" +ut the way to attain large ,uantities of !anure is to have large herds of

livestoc , busily consu!ing the grain that would otherwise feed people" Inorganic fertilizers based on petroleu! and other !inerals can renew soil on a global scale ** at least as long as the petroleu! holds out"

THE GREEN REVOLUTION #5 +orlaug, the argu!ent for high*yield cereal crops, inorganic fertilizers, and irrigation beca!e irrefutable when the global population began to ta e off after the 2econd $orld $ar" +ut !any govern!ents of developing nations were suspicious, partly for reasons of tradition Awheat was then a foreign substance in IndiaB and partly because contact between $estern technical e%perts and peasant far!ers !ight sha e up feudal cultures to the disco!fort of the elite classes" Meanwhile, so!e co!!entators were suggesting that it would be wrong to increase the food supply in the developing world6 better to let nature do the dirty wor of restraining the hu!an population" 3et statistics suggest that high*yield agriculture bra es population growth rather than accelerating it, by starting the progression fro! the high*birth*rate, high*death*rate societies of feudal cultures toward the low*birth*rate, low*death*rate societies of $estern nations" As the for!er Indian diplo!at (aran 2ingh is reported to have said, 9?evelop!ent is the best contraceptive"9 In subsistence agriculture children are viewed as !anual labor, and thus large nu!bers are desired" In technical agriculture nowledge beco!es !ore i!portant, and parents thus have fewer children in order to devote resources to their education" In -.1@ the Roc efeller 7oundation and the govern!ent of Me%ico established CIMM3#, as an outgrowth of their original progra!, and sent +orlaug to Pa istan and India, which were then descending into fa!ine" 'e failed in his initial efforts to persuade the parastatal seed and grain !onopolies that those countries had established after independence to switch to high*yield crop strains" ?espite the institutional resistance +orlaug stayed in Pa istan and India, tirelessly repeating hi!self" +y -.1= fa!ine on the subcontinent was so bad that govern!ents !ade a co!!it!ent to dwarf wheat" +orlaug arranged for a convoy of thirty*five truc s to carry high*yield seeds fro! CIMM3# to a :os Angeles doc for ship!ent" #he convoy was held up by the Me%ican police, bloc ed by 4"2" border agents atte!pting to enforce a ban on seed i!portation, and then stopped by the National ;uard when the $atts riot prevented access to the :"A" harbor" 7inally the seed ship sailed" +orlaug says, 9I went to bed thin ing the proble! was at last solved, and wo e up to the news that war had bro en out between India and Pa istan"9 Nevertheless, +orlaug and !any local scientists who were his for!er trainees in Me%ico planted the first crop of dwarf wheat on the subcontinent, so!eti!es wor ing within sight of artillery flashes" 2owed late, that crop ger!inated poorly, yet yields still rose /0 percent" #his prevented general warti!e starvation in the region, though fa!ine did stri e parts of India" #here were also

riots in the state of (erala in -.11, when a population whose ancestors had for centuries eaten rice was presented with sac s of wheat flour originating in +orlaug)s fields" 5wing to warti!e e!ergency, +orlaug was given the go*ahead to circu!vent the parastatals" 9$ithin a few hours of that decision I had all the seed contracts signed and a !uch larger planting effort in place,9 he says" 9If it hadn)t been for the war, I !ight never have been given true freedo! to test these ideas"9 #he ne%t harvest 9was beautiful, a .> percent i!prove!ent"9 +y -.1> Pa istan was self*sufficient in wheat production" India re,uired only a few years longer" Paul Ehrlich had written in The Population Bomb A-.1>B that it was 9a fantasy9 that India would 9ever9 feed itself" +y -./< India was self*sufficient in the production of all cereals" Pa istan progressed fro! harvesting @"< !illion tons of wheat annually when +orlaug arrived to around -> !illion today, India fro! -- !illion tons to 10 !illion" In both nations food production since the -.10s has increased faster than the rate of population growth" +riefly in the !id*-.>0s India even entered the world e%port !ar et for grains" +orlaug)s !a&estic acco!plish!ent ca!e to be labeled the ;reen Revolution" $hether it was really a revolution is open to debate" As Robert (ates, a for!er director of the $orld 'unger Progra!, at +rown 4niversity, says, 9If you plot growth in far! yields over the century, the -.10s period does not particularly stand out for overall global trends" $hat does stand out is the !ove!ent of yield increases fro! the $est to the developing world, and +orlaug was one of the crucial innovators there"9 #ouring the subcontinent in the late -.10s and encountering field after field of robust wheat, 7orrest 7ran 'ill, a for!er vice*president of the 7ord 7oundation, told +orlaug, 9En&oy this now, because nothing li e it will ever happen to you again" Eventually the naysayers and the bureaucrats will cho e you to death, and you won)t be able to get per!ission for !ore of these efforts"9

THE HIGH-YIELD BOOM 75R so!e ti!e this augury see!ed !ista en, as +orlaug)s view of agriculture re!ained ascendant" In -.=0 the world produced 1.C !illion tons of grain for C"C billion peopleD by -..C production was -". billion tons for ="1 billion people ** C"> ti!es the grain for C"C ti!es the population" ;lobal grain yields rose fro! 0"<= tons per acre to -"- tonsD yields of corn, rice, and other foodstuffs i!proved si!ilarly" 7ro! -.1= to -..0 the globe)s daily per capita inta e grew fro! C,01@ calories to C,<.=, with an increased proportion as protein" Malnutrition continued as a proble! of global scale but decreased in percentage ter!s, even as !ore than two billion people were added to the population" #he world)s -.=0 grain output of 1.C !illion tons ca!e fro! -"/ billion acres of cropland, the -..C output of -". billion tons fro! -"/@ billion acres ** a -/0 percent increase fro! one percent !ore land" 9$ithout high*yield agriculture,9 +orlaug says, 9either !illions would have starved or increases in food output would have been realized through drastic e%pansion of acres under cultivation ** losses of pristine land a hundred ti!es greater than all losses to urban and suburban e%pansion"9

#he trend toward harvesting !ore fro! fewer acres, often spun in the !edia as a shoc ing crisis of 9vanishing far!s,9 is perhaps the !ost environ!entally favorable develop!ent of the !odern age" Paul $aggoner, of the Connecticut Agricultural E%peri!ent 2tation, says, 97ro! long before Malthus until about forty*five years ago each person too !ore land fro! nature than his parents did" 7or the past forty*five years people have been ta ing less land fro! nature than their parents"9 In developing nations where population growth is surging, high*yield agriculture holds bac the ra!pant deforestation of wild areas" $aggoner calculates that India)s transition to high*yield far!ing spared the country fro! having to plough an additional -00 !illion acres of virgin land ** an area about e,uivalent to California" In the past five years India has been able to slow and perhaps even halt its national deforestation, a hopeful sign" #his would have been i!possible were India still feeding itself with traditionally cultivated indigenous crops"

BA !LASH N5NE#'E:E22, by the -.>0s finding fault with high*yield agriculture had beco!e fashionable" Environ!entalists began to tell the 7ord and Roc efeller 7oundations and $estern govern!ents that high*yield techni,ues would despoil the developing world" As +orlaug turned his attention to high*yield pro&ects for Africa, where !ass starvation still see!ed a plausible threat, so!e green organizations beca!e deter!ined to stop hi! there" 9#he environ!ental co!!unity in the -.>0s went crazy pressuring the donor countries and the big foundations not to support ideas li e inorganic fertilizers for Africa,9 says ?avid 2ec ler, the director of the International Irrigation Manage!ent Institute" Environ!ental lobbyists persuaded the 7ord 7oundation and the $orld +an to bac off fro! !ost African agriculture pro&ects" #he Roc efeller 7oundation largely bac ed away too ** though it !ight have in any case, because it was shifting toward an e!phasis on biotechnological agricultural research" 9$orld +an fear of green political pressure in $ashington beca!e the single biggest obstacle to feeding Africa,9 +orlaug says" #he green parties of $estern Europe persuaded !ost of their govern!ents to stop supplying fertilizer to AfricaD an e%ception was Norway, which has a large crown corporation that !a es fertilizer and avidly pro!otes its use" +orlaug, once an honored presence at the 7ord and Roc efeller 7oundations, beca!e, he says, 9a tar baby to the! politically, because all the ideas the greenies couldn)t stand were stic ing to !e"9 +orlaug)s reaction to the ca!paign was anger" 'e says, 92o!e of the environ!ental lobbyists of the $estern nations are the salt of the earth, but !any of the! are elitists" #hey)ve never e%perienced the physical sensation of hunger" #hey do their lobbying fro! co!fortable office suites in $ashington or +russels" If they lived &ust one !onth a!id the !isery of the developing world, as I have for fifty years, they)d be crying out for tractors and fertilizer and irrigation canals and be outraged that fashionable elitists bac ho!e were trying to deny the! these things"9

In -.><, at the age of seventy*one, +orlaug was drawn out of retire!ent by Ryoichi 2asa awa, who with 8i!!y Carter was wor ing to get African agriculture !oving" Carter was ca!paigning in favor of fertilizer aid to Africa, as he still does today" #he for!er President had fallen in with 2asa awa, who during the 2econd $orld $ar had founded the National Essence Mass Party, a 8apanese fascist group, but who in later life developed a conscience" #oday the 2asa awa Peace 7oundation is a leading supporter of disar!a!ent initiativesD Carter and 2asa awa often !ade &oint appearances for worthy causes" 2asa awa called +orlaug, who related his inability to obtain $orld +an or foundation help for high*yield*agriculture initiatives in Africa" 2asa awa was du!bfounded that a Nobel Peace Prize winner couldn)t get bac ing for a philanthropic endeavor" 'e offered to fund +orlaug in Africa for five years" +orlaug said, 9I)! seventy*one" I)! too old to start again"9 2asa awa replied, 9I)! fifteen years older than you, so I guess we should have started yesterday"9 +orlaug, Carter, and 2asa awa traveled to Africa to pic sites, and the foundation 2asa awa*;lobal C000 was born" 9I assu!ed we)d do a few years of research first,9 +orlaug says, 9but after I saw the terrible circu!stances there, I said, ):et)s &ust start growing")9 2oon +orlaug was running pro&ects in +enin, Ethiopia, ;hana, Nigeria, 2udan, #anzania, and #ogo" 3ields of corn ,uic ly tripledD yields of wheat, cassava, sorghu!, and cow peas also grew" +orlaug !ade progress even in 2udan, near the dry 2ahel, though that pro&ect ended with the onset of 2udan)s civil war, in -..C" 5nly 2asa awa)s foundation ca!e forward with !ore funds, but although well endowed, it is no $orld +an " Environ!entalists continued to say that che!ical fertilizers would cause an ecological cala!ity in Africa" 5pponents of high*yield agriculture 9too the nu!bers for water pollution caused by fertilizer runoff in the 4nited 2tates and applied the! to Africa, which is totally fallacious,9 ?avid 2ec ler says" 9Che!ical*fertilizer use in Africa is so tiny you could increase application for decades before causing the environ!ental side effects we see here" Meanwhile, Africa is ruining its wildlife habitat with slash*and*burn far!ing, which !any co!!entators ro!anticize because it is indigenous"9 +orlaug found that so!e foundation !anagers and $orld +an officials had beco!e hopelessly confused regarding the distinction between pesticides and fertilizer" 'e says, 9#he opponents of high*yield for Africa were spea ing of the two as if they were the sa!e because they)re both !ade fro! che!icals, when the scales of to%icity are vastly different" 7ertilizer only replaces substances naturally present in the soils anyway"9 In Africa and throughout the developing world +orlaug and !ost other agrono!ists now teach for!s of Eintegrated pest !anage!ent,F which reduces pesticide use because che!icals are sprayed at the !ost vulnerable point in an insect)s life cycle" +orlaug says, 9All serious agrono!ists now that pesticides !ust be ept to a !ini!u!, and besides, pesticides are e%pensive" +ut so!ehow the !edia believe the overspraying is still going on, and this creates a bias against high*yield agriculture"9 Indonesia has for nearly a decade i!proved rice yields while reducing pesticide use by e!ploying integrated pest !anage!ent" #he use of pesticides has been in decline relative to far! production for !ore than a decade in the 4nited 2tates, where the use of fertilizer, too, has started declining relative to production"

2uch develop!ents have begun to sway so!e of +orlaug)s opposition" #he Co!!ittee on 2ustainable Agriculture, a coalition of environ!ental and develop!ent*oriented groups, has beco!e so!ewhat open to fertilizer use in Africa" 9#he environ!ental !ove!ent went through a phase of revulsion against any che!ical use in agriculture,9 says Robert +la e, the co!!ittee)s chair!an" 9People are co!ing to realize that is &ust not realistic" Nor!an has been right about this all along"9 5ne reason the ground is shifting bac in his direction, +orlaug believes, is that the green parties of Europe have been frightened by the sudden wave of !igrants entering their traditionally low*i!!igration nations, and now thin that i!proving conditions in Africa isn)t such a bad idea after all" 2upposing that opposition to high*yield agriculture for Africa declines, the ,uestion beco!es $hat can be acco!plished thereG Pierre Crosson, an agricultural analyst for the nonpartisan thin tan Resources for the 7uture, calculates that sub*2aharan Africa needs to increase far! yields by @"@ percent annually for the ne%t thirty years !erely to eep pace with the population growth that is pro&ected" #his !eans that Africa !ust do what the A!erican Midwest did" 9Africa has the lowest far! yields in the world and also a large a!ount of undeveloped land, so in theory a huge increase in food production could happen,9 says 8ohn +ongaarts, the research director of the Population Council, a nonprofit international research organization" 9If southern 2udan was par ed in the Midwest, they)d be growing stuff li e crazy there now"9 Practical proble!s, however, !a e +ongaarts thin that rapid African yield increases are 9e%tre!ely unli ely in the near future"9 #he obvious obstacles are desperate poverty and lac of social cohesion" $hen +orlaug transfor!ed the agriculture of Pa istan and India, those nations had !any proble!s but also reasonably well organized econo!ies, good road and rail syste!s, irrigation pro&ects under way, and an established entrepreneurial ethos" Much of Africa lac s these" Additionally, African countries often lac a social focus on increasing agricultural output" 3oung !en, especially, consider the far! a bac water fro! which they long to escape to the city" African govern!ents and technical !inistries tend to loo down on food production as an old* fashioned econo!ic sector, longing instead for high*tech facilities that suggest $estern prestige and power" 3et a basic reason that the 4nited 2tates and the European 4nion nations are so strong is that they have achieved al!ost total !astery over agriculture, producing a!ple food at ever*lower prices" An encouraging e%a!ple of an African govern!ent ta ing a progressive view of agriculture co!es fro! Ethiopia, where, since the end of its civil war, +orlaug has run his !ost successful African pro&ect" Hisiting Ethiopia in -..<, 8i!!y Carter too Pri!e Minister Meles Ienawi on a tour of places where +orlaug)s ideas could be tested, and won Ienawi)s support for an e%tension* service ca!paign to aid far!ers" ?uring the -..=*-..1 season Ethiopia recorded the greatest harvests of !a&or crops in its history, with a @C percent increase in production and a -= percent increase in average yield over the previous season" 4se of the fertilizer dia!!oniu! phosphate was the ey refor!" #he rapid yield growth suggests that other sub*2aharan countries !ay also have hope for increased food production"

$hether Africa can increase its food production !ay soon beco!e one of the ,uestions of international affairs" It !ay be one at which, in a decade or two, $estern govern!ents will frantically throw !oney after a crisis hits, whereas !ore*!oderate invest!ents begun now !ight avert the day of rec oning" And one of the ,uestions of the ne%t century !ay be whether the world can feed itself at all"

"# BILLION MOUTHS 'I2 opponents !ay not now it, but +orlaug has long warned of the dangers of population growth" 9In !y Nobel lecture,9 +orlaug says, 9I suggested we had until the year C000 to ta!e the population !onster, and then food shortages would ta e us under" Now I believe we have a little longer" #he ;reen Revolution can !a e Africa productive" #he brea up of the for!er 2oviet 4nion has caused its grain output to plu!!et, but if the new republics recover econo!ically, they could produce vast a!ounts of food" More fertilizer can !a e the favored lands of :atin A!erica ** especially Argentina and +razil ** !ore productive" #he cerrado region of +razil, a very large area long assu!ed to be infertile because of to%ic soluble alu!inu! in the soil, !ay beco!e a breadbas et, because alu!inu!*resistant crop strains are being developed"9 #his last is an e%a!ple of agricultural advances and environ!ental protection going hand in hand6 in the past decade the deforestation rate in the A!azon rain forest has declined so!ewhat, partly because the cerrado now loo s !ore attractive" +orlaug continues, 9+ut Africa, the for!er 2oviet republics, and the cerrado are the last frontiers" After they are in use, the world will have no additional sizable bloc s of arable land left to put into production, unless you are willing to level whole forests, which you should not do" 2o future food*production increases will have to co!e fro! higher yields" And though I have no doubt yields will eep going up, whether they can go up enough to feed the population !onster is another !atter" 4nless progress with agricultural yields re!ains very strong, the ne%t century will e%perience sheer hu!an !isery that, on a nu!erical scale, will e%ceed the worst of everything that has co!e before"9 +ut 9very strong9 progress on yields see!s proble!atic" 8ohn +ongaarts calculates that agricultural yields outside $estern countries !ust double in the co!ing century !erely to !aintain current ** and inade,uate ** nutrition levels" #he 4nited Nations pro&ects that hu!an nu!bers will reach about ."> billion, fro! about ="> billion today, around the year C0=0" #o bring the entire world)s diet in that year to a level co!parable to that of the $est, +ongaarts calculates, would re,uire a <@0 percent increase in food production" :ester +rown, the head of the $orldwatch Institute, an environ!ental organization, fears that China !ay soon turn fro! an agricultural success story into a nation of shortages" +ecause !uch of it is !ountainous, China already uses !ost of its attractive tillage area, leaving scant roo! for e%pansion" Its re!ar able i!prove!ents in wheat and rice yields have co!e in part, +rown thin s, at the e%pense of depleting the national water table6 irrigation water !ay soon beco!e scarce" As newly affluent Chinese consu!ers de!and !ore chic en and beef, feeding increased a!ounts of grain to ani!als !ay cause grain scarcity" If, as so!e e%perts pro&ect, the Chinese

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population rises fro! -"C billion to -"1 billion, yield increases will not bridge the difference, +rown fears" Privatization and dwarf rice have enabled China to raise rice yields rapidly to about -"1 tons per acre ** close to the world)s best figure of two tons" +ut recently rice*yield increases have flattened" #he International Rice Research Institute is wor ing on a new strain that !ay boost yields dra!atically, but whether it will prosper in the field is un nown" Is!ail 2erageldin, the chair!an of the Consultative ;roup on International Agricultural Research, in $ashington, ?"C", believes that the 9biological !a%i!u!9 for rice yield is about seven tons per acre ** four ti!es today)s average in developing countries, but perhaps a line that cannot be crossed" An i!portant un nown is whether genetic engineering will i!prove agricultural yields" Corn is a!ong the highest*yielding plants" 9If the high natural !ultiples of !aize could be transferred by gene engineering to wheat or rice, there could be a tre!endous world yield i!prove!ent,9 Paul $aggoner, of the Connecticut Agricultural E%peri!ent 2tation, says" 2o far genetic engineering has not produced any higher*yielding strains, though it does show pro!ise for reducing pesticide application" 2o!e researchers also thin that biotechnology will be able to pac !ore protein and !inerals into cereal grains" 5thers, +orlaug a!ong the!, are s eptical about whether yield itself can be engineered" 2o far gene reco!bination can !ove only single genes or s!all contiguous gene units" +orlaug says, 94nless there is one !aster gene for yield, which I)! guessing there is not, engineering for yield will be very co!ple%" It !ay happen eventually, but through the co!ing decades we !ust assu!e that gene engineering will not be the answer to the world)s food proble!s"9 #oday +orlaug divides his ti!e a!ong CIMM3#, where he teaches young scientists see ing still*!ore*productive crop strains for the developing worldD #e%as AJM, where he teaches international agriculture every fall se!esterD and the 2asa awa*;lobal C000 pro&ects that continue to operate in twelve African nations" +orlaug)s Africa pro&ect is a private*sector effort run by an obscure Nobel Peace Prize winner and a for!er A!erican President whose altruistic i!pulses are !ade sport of in the A!erican press" Its goal is so!ething the $est see!s al!ost to have given up on ** the rescue of Africa fro! hu!an suffering" Recently $estern govern!ents have been easing out of African aid, pleading 9donor fatigue,9 the difficulty of overco!ing corruption, and fear of criticis! fro! the environ!ental lobby" Private organizations, including +orlaug)s, Catholic Relief 2ervices, and 5%fa!, carry on what)s left of the fight" If overpopulation anarchy co!es, it is li ely to arrive first in Africa" +orlaug understands this, and is using his re!aining years to wor against that cataclys!" #he odds against hi! see! long" +ut then, Nor!an +orlaug has already saved !ore lives than any other person who ever lived"