

Forgotten Benefactor of Humanity (1997) - mike_esspe
http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1997/01/forgotten-benefactor-of-humanity/306101/?single_page=true

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pm90
Norman Borlaug is truly a forgotten hero. As a kid growing up in India, the
story about the Green Revolution went somewhat like this: "In the early 60's,
India realised that we would face massive food shortages. So, a program of
research was initiated and scientists came up with better quality crops. The
man most responsible for this was Mr.M.S. Swaminathan
(<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M._S._Swaminathan)>

Its true that Mr.Swaminathan was instrumental in leading the effort that
adapted the foreign crops to Indian tastes (yes, the rice/wheat apparently
tasted/looked unappealing). But the most significant breakthrough was by
Mr.Borlaug, who I heard about only after reading this excellent article as an
adult: [http://www.thelibertypapers.org/2009/09/13/norman-borlaug-
th...](http://www.thelibertypapers.org/2009/09/13/norman-borlaug-the-man-who-
saved-a-billion-people/)

Without Mr.Borlaug's initiative, progress in India would not have been
possible. He has my sincerest gratitude for his work.

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jacoblyles
He is well known and deservedly celebrated among groups where few people
suffer from the naturalist fallacy, such as libertarians and futurists

~~~
tomjen3
Unfortunately such groups have very little power and are generally looked down
on.

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JoeAltmaier
Henry A Wallace did for America what Norman Borlaug did for the world; he's a
lot more familiar, and his story is as tremendous.

Not very exciting but a summary:
[http://bioguide.congress.gov/scripts/biodisplay.pl?index=w00...](http://bioguide.congress.gov/scripts/biodisplay.pl?index=w000077)

As a child he walked the countryside around Iowa State University with
Emeritus Professor George Washington Carver, learning to love biology.

As a scientist he determined canny American farmers wouldn't accept a handout,
but would buy better seed stock, so formed Pioneer Hybrid seed company (in his
back yard) and marketed better seed as a new American ideal.

As VP and Secty of Ag, he formed the US Agriculture Extension program to
promote agriculture education across American and around the world via
Research Stations.

For better or for worse, he's personally responsible for the use of corn as
the standard crop. He changed the direction of the world, and can be credited
with feeding billions.

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Surio
That article is more than a decade old! Much water has flown under the bridge
since then. Fast forward to 2012, the "developed world" itself is conceding
there are also many problems with this "green revolution" approach, that it is
no longer appropriate to continue with this monocultural, faddish fixation of
"technological, scientific solution always saves the world". For e.g:

[http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=1029447...](http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=102944731)

/rant

Meanwhile all aspects of food and water, both of which are a fundamental human
need, has been heavily commoditised and abstracted out of our view all the way
to _reductio ad absurdum_ levels in modern discourse. It is going to take
several unmitigated disasters before nuanced views around this topic will even
gain traction.

/rant

~~~
kiba
From what I previously read on india:

Farmers often waste water because water is "free", and the majority of the
food often rot. This exacerbate the problem of farming enough for everyone
eat.

We'll need technological solution, in addition to taking a variety of non-
technological measures in order to protect our harvest and the local
environment, such as encouraging farmers to use only as much water necessary
to grow their crops.

~~~
tomjen3
We already have that technology.

It is called capitalism and it has worked wonders in the west (how many people
are starving in the UK?). Start by charging whatever the water cost to produce
and see the changes that makes.

I keep being surprised by people who hate capitalism so much that they would
rather see people starve.

~~~
cincinnatus
You can't charge what the water 'cost', it was thousands of years of filtering
into the underground aquifers. And it is too late, the water has been used.
Same problem with any non- or slow replenishing natural resource that we've
been boosting off of at accelerated rates. When they run out dependent systems
have the potential for rapid failure, much more rapid than we are likely to
come up with solutions for, and people will die. Supply and demand work, but
people will die in the process.

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tsotha
Forgotten by whom?

