WELCOME TO OUR CYBERSPACE DISCUSSION ON

AGRICULTURE AND THE ENVIRONMENT

WITH NORMAN BORLAUG AND SARA SCHERR, JANUARY 5 – 9, 2004.

 

1. INTRODUCTION (Below)
2. DISCUSSION QUESTIONS (Prepared by Beahrs ELP Alumni)

3. RESPONSES from Drs. Borlaug and Dowswell
4. RESPONSES from Dr. Sara Scherr
5. POSTINGS to discussion in chronological order
(57 postings from 19 countries)
6. SUMMARY

INTRODUCTION

This discussion originated with the memorable visit of Dr. Norman Borlaug to the Beahrs Environmental Leadership Program’s summer course at U.C. Berkeley in July 2003.  His two-day visit, lectures and informal exchanges generated great enthusiasm and many questions among ELP participants from around the world.  You may hear these lectures and more about the visit by going to this website’s CD-ROM – summer course, panels/sessions (http://www.cnr.berkeley.edu/csrd/cdrom/dswmedia/csrd_start_page.html).

 Since there was insufficient time to delve into ELP participants’ questions during the 2003 course, we decided to organize a “cyberspace” discussion for January 2004.  Questions were submitted by ELP alumni over several months, condensed into the four questions posted here.  They cover agronomic, technological, environmental, economic, political and social justice/equity aspects of the future of global and regional agricultural development and food security.

 In addition to involving Dr. Borlaug in responding to these questions and participating in the discussion, we asked ecoagriculture expert, Dr. Sara Scherr, to also provide written responses and participate in the discussion.  Sara Scherr is Executive Director of Ecoagriculture Partners, Senior Associate of Forest Trends, and member of the UN’s Hunger Task Force.  She is co-author, with Jeff McNeeley, of  Ecoagriculture: Strategies to Feed the World and Save Wild Biodiversity. Island Press: Washington, D.C.  Her responses are posted here.

Written responses to the ELP questions were prepared by Norman Borlaug with Chris Dowswell (Special Advisor to President, Director of Communications, Sasakawa Africa Association) and Sara Scherr, and are posted here for your review.  Finally, we prepared a summary of points of agreement and disagreement between Borlaug and Scherr regarding the three main topics: Green Revolution & the Environment; Green Revolution, Sustainability & Social Equity; and Agriculture, Globalization & Biotechnology, posted here.

 

THE DISCUSSION

 The Cyberspace discussion was organized as follows:

 JANUARY 5, 6 AND 7: Moderated discussion among ELP alumni, with posted questions and responses as background documents.
JANUARY 7 - Summary of discussion compiled and distributed.
JANUARY 8 AND 9 - Interactive discussion with ELP alumni, Norman Borlaug, Sara Scherr and invited guests.

The discussion period was from January 5 through January 13, 2004.   Participants from around the world will join in as time and schedules permit.  The Beahrs ELP will moderate the discussion from offices at the University of California, Berkeley.

 
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