Today we understand the environmental damage caused by some of the very methods that were seen as solutions back then. And today we in the developed world lack the political will to invest in agricultural development for developing countries. For all of these reasons, we must look to philanthropic foundations and others of vision and means to step up to this challenge. These nations need strong public institutions for agriculture and significant additional investments in research. And they need access to the best and most appropriate technologies, from modern genetics to organic methods, to serve the needs of farmers and local entrepreneurs who will play the critical roles.
History shows the political consequences of hunger, disease and starvation in the human family.
The scale of disaster that could result from agriculture's failure in the less developed countries would far exceed anything we have experienced. The writer is professor of plant pathology, molecular biology and environmental studies at the University of Wisconsin in Madison and chair of the oversight committee of the McKnight Foundation's Collaborative Crop Research Program. He contributed this comment to the International Herald Tribune .