Grieving the Death and Celebrating the Life of Dr Norman Borlaug
The Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa grieves the passing of Dr Norman Borlaug, the father of the Green Revolution and an infinite source of inspiration in the cause of ending hunger and poverty. We celebrate his life, his dedicated work and passionate resolve. It was through Dr Borlaug’s efforts that farmers across much of Asia and Latin America were able to grow enough food to avert famine and save the lives of hundreds of millions of people.
Although his work is unfinished, his legacy continues to inspire and inform our best efforts to achieve a food secure and prosperous Africa. We aspire to carry forward his legacy: of persistence, humility and a relentless drive to end hunger through empowering people and nations to grow their own food.
Dr Borlaug’s achievements in Asia and Latin America received global recognition, ranging from the 1970 Nobel Peace Prize for his Green Revolution work, to receipt of the US Congressional Gold Medal in 2007. He also established the World Food Prize, considered to be the Nobel for Agriculture.
What is less well known than his work in Asia, however, is Dr Borlaug’s role in advocating for a Green Revolution in Africa. He was painfully aware that the science-based farming practices that did so much to feed the populations elsewhere failed to take hold in Africa, where population growth has continued to outstrip food production.
Dr Borlaug took on this daunting challenge. In 1983, he joined forces with Mr Ryoichi Sasakawa, the founder of the Nippon Foundation, and former US President Jimmy Carter to seek sustainable solutions to Africa’s chronic food security problems. The answer, as he so often said, lay with Africa’s small-scale farmers, starved of the technology and resources that could transform their lives and ultimately the economies of their countries.
Over the next two decades, as head of Sasakawa-Global 2000, Dr Borlaug’s work touched the lives of millions of Africa’s farmers and thousands of government extension professionals and their counterparts in agricultural research. His work on farmers’ fields – aiming to ‘set the grassroots on fire’ as he liked to say – and his ceaseless advocacy with African governments and policy-makers have helped ensure that agriculture is now at the heart of Africa’s development agenda.
His words and work were an inspiration as well for Mr Kofi A Annan, who as Secretary General of the United Nations, called for a uniquely African Green Revolution, and who now chairs AGRA.
Just months prior to the launch of AGRA, at the African Fertilizer Summit in Abuja, Nigeria, Dr. Borlaug challenged African and world leaders to find the political will to start an African Green Revolution by replenishing the continent's severely depleted soils.
"The knowledge currently exists to set an African Green Revolution in motion. What's missing is the appropriate political will and economic policies," he told participants at the age of 92. "The potential is there, but you can't eat potential. You've got to convert it to grain and food!"
The launch of AGRA in 2006 was itself a continuation of Dr Borlaug’s work. Today, AGRA is working to achieve a uniquely African Green Revolution: one that takes into account the great diversity of our crops and farming environments, our reliance on rain-fed agriculture, the acute problem of degraded soils—which Dr Borlaug called a ticking time bomb, and the new challenges of climate change.
Africa’s Green Revolution will not only be a technological revolution, but also a revolution in our thinking. It will entail comprehensive changes of Africa’s agricultural system and policies, putting smallholder farmers and environmental sustainability at the center of agricultural development.
Norman Borlaug died before his vision of an African Green Revolution could be realized. But his legacy lives on. The best way we can honor Norman Borlaug is to do our utmost to make the dream of a smallholder-driven African Green Revolution a reality.
Dr Namanga Ngongi, President, AGRA
September 16, 2009
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About the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA)
AGRA is a dynamic partnership working across the African continent to help millions of small-scale farmers and their families lift themselves out of poverty and hunger. AGRA programmes develop practical solutions to significantly boost farm productivity and incomes for the poor while safeguarding the environment. AGRA advocates for policies that support its work across all key aspects of the African agricultural value chain from seeds, soil health and water to markets and agricultural education.
AGRA's Board of Directors is chaired by Kofi A Annan, former Secretary-General of the United Nations. Dr Namanga Ngongi, former Deputy Executive Director of the World Food Programme, is AGRA's president. With support from The Rockefeller Foundation, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the UK's Department for International Development and other donors, AGRA works across sub-Saharan Africa and maintains offices in Nairobi, Kenya, and Accra, Ghana.