Borlaug, N. E.

Norman Ernest Borlaug, B.S. (1937), M.S. (1941), Ph.D. (1942) University of Minnesota. Winner of the 1970 Nobel Peace Prize in recognition of his development of high-yield, disease resistant wheat that is credited with saving billions of people from starvation. Widely considered the public face of the Green Revolution, creator of the World Food Prize (1987), winner of the Presidential Medal of Freedom (1977), and Congressional Gold Medal (2007).

Norman Borlaug was born on March 25, 1914 in Cresco, Iowa to parents Henry and Clara Borlaug. Borlaug grew up on the family’s grain and dairy farm and received his early education in a one room schoolhouse that served the rural community of Saude, Iowa. After graduating from Cresco High School in 1932 he applied for admission to the University of Minnesota. Despite initially failing his entrance exam he re-applied and began his academic career in the University’s General College in 1933, eventually transferring to the College of Agriculture and majoring in Forestry. Borlaug received his B.S. in forestry in 1937 and married Margaret Gibson that same year. Between 1938 and 1939 he worked for the United States Forestry Service in both Massachusetts and Idaho. Borlaug earned two more degrees from the University of Minnesota: a M.S. in plant pathology in 1941 (supervised by C. M. Christiansen) and Ph.D. in plant pathology and genetics in 1942 (supervised by J.M. Christiansen). During his tenure at the University of Minnesota he worked closely with E.C. Stakman, head of the Division of Plant Pathology. Borlaug was also an accomplished athlete, earning a berth on the University’s Big 10 wrestling squad.

Borlaug was employed as a plant pathologist for E.I. DuPont in Wilmington, Delaware from 1942-1944. In 1944 he was approached by the Rockefeller Foundation and the Mexican government to participate in a new program designed to expand agricultural production in Mexico. Borlaug accepted the Rockefeller offer and moved to Mexico where he served as the organizer and director of the Cooperative Wheat Research and Production Program located outside of Ciudad Obregon. With a team of Mexican student scientists, he began analyzing soil fertility, farming methods and crop output, as well as experimenting with an array of wheat varieties bred to combat wheat rust. Borlaug’s teams focused on three aspects of increased production: creating disease-resistant wheat hybrids, developing adaptability in the hybrids to guarantee that they would grow in diverse climates and conditions, and breeding features into the hybrids that generated higher yields. After years of experimentation, Borlaug’s work in the field succeeded in producing an adaptable, disease-resistant, high-yield hybrid wheat. By 1956, Mexico was self-sustaining in wheat production for the first time in its history.

With the success of hybridized wheat in Mexico, the Rockefeller Foundation and the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) sent Borlaug to Northern Africa, Iran, India and Pakistan in 1959 to investigate the possibility of applying the new techniques developed in Mexico to African and Asian wheat and barley crop production. In 1964 the Ford and Rockefeller Foundations established the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center/ Centro Internacional de Mejoramiento de Maize y Trigo (CIMMYT), an autonomous international research training institute. CIMMYT was modeled on the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI), a experimental rice-breeding station in the Philippines which brought together young scientists from around the world to study and apply food-plant breeding and cultivation methods. Borlaug was named the director of CIMMYT’s International Wheat Improvement Program in 1966. During the late 1960s and early 1970s, Pakistan and India sent scientists to Mexico for field training under Borlaug’s supervision. Both governments also imported tons of Mexican hybrid wheat seed for local planting. The South Asian program was an enormous success, dramatically raising yields and significantly reducing hunger in both countries.

After the success of Mexico, the Rockefeller Foundation invested in other cooperative food production projects around the globe focusing on increasing rice, corn, potatoes and cassava yields using Borlaug’s rigorous field methods.

For his contributions toward in plant breeding and high-yield planting, Norman Borlaug was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1970. He has since become known as the public face of the Green Revolution, a movement associated with dramatic advances in agriculture and food production and distribution following World War II.

Dr. Borlaug served as the director of the CIMMYT Wheat Program until 1979, but continued on as a consultant for many years. Throughout the 1980s and 1990s he continued his field work and research, collaborating with former president Jimmy Carter and Japanese philanthropist Ryoichi Sasakawa to improve food production in sub-Saharan Africa. As president of the Sasakawa Africa Association and senior consultant of the Global 2000 initiative, he taught in the field and lectured extensively on the interconnection of technology, infrastructure and land use in addressing global hunger. In 1984 he became a distinguished professor of international agriculture at Texas A&M University. In 1987 he established the World Food Prize, a Nobel-styled award recognizing innovation in food production for the purpose of advancing world peace. He received over 50 honorary degrees and awards, including the Vannevar Bush Award for lifetime achievement in science and the National Medal of Science (2006); the Presidential Medal of Freedom (1977); the Congressional Gold Medal (2007); the Public Welfare Medal from the U.S. National Academy of Sciences (2002); and the Padma Vibhushan, India's second highest civilian award (2006). Dr. Borlaug has served on the faculty of the University of Minnesota, University of Iowa, Cornell University and most recently at Texas A&M University. Norman Borlaug died on September 12, 2009.

From the guide to the Norman E. Borlaug papers, 1930-2006, (University of Minnesota Libraries. University of Minnesota Archives [uarc])