The foundation was established in 1988 by Dr. M.S. Swaminathan, India’s best-known agricultural scientist, and a world-renowned thinker and science philosopher with the prize money received by him with the “World Food Prize” in 1987. Development Alternatives is privileged to have Dr. M.S. Swaminathan on its “Board of Governors.” We, the Development Alternatives family, extend our sincere felicitations to MSSRF with whom we share the dream for a better world and travel on parallel development pathway. Excerpts from Dr. M.S. Swaminathan’s acceptance speech delivered in Tokyo, are reproduced here.

Excerpts

As we approach a new century we can look back and draw a balance sheet of our achievements and failures. Spectacular progress in science and technology ranks first among our major accomplishments. Recent advances in biotechnology and genetic engineering, space technology, information technology and new materials have opened up uncommon opportunities for a world where every individual can lead a healthy and productive life. The spread of democracy, the breakdown of apartheid and the advent of the information age have created the socio-political substrate essential for integrating the principles of intra-and inter-generational equity in public policy. The power of a right blend of technology and public policy is strikingly evident from the progress made to keep the growth rate in food production above the rate of population growth thereby ensuring that the Malthusian prediction of population overtaking food production does not come true. But despite all these achievements, we will face, in the new millennium, some great social and scientific challenges.

Environmental degradation and increasing economic and gender inequality are among the most serious problems we face today. The rich-poor divide is increasing at an alarming rate. The pattern of development adopted by rich societies is leading to jobless economic growth, pollution and potential changes in climate. Unsustainable lifestyles of the rich and unacceptable poverty co-exist. The absence of an educational and healthy environment – conducive to every child achieving his/her innate genetic potential for physical and mental development – leads to the spread of poverty in capability.

If the current pace of damage to the ecological foundations essential for sustainable advances in biological productivity – namely land, water, flora, fauna, forests, oceans and the atmosphere continues, sustainable food and nutrition security cannot be achieved.

This is why we have to produce more in the coming decades but differently. To achieve such a shift, the following basic ground rules must be followed in technology development and dissemination and in public policy.

First, advances in production must be based on linking the ecological security of an area with the security of livelihood in a symbiotic manner.

Second, steps must be taken to create widespread awareness of the population supporting capacity of different ecosystems. Sustainable systems of management of soil, water, biodiversity and forests should be internalized in rural societies.

Third, because the poor have no productive assets and there is no value to their time, asset creation and value addition to time should receive high priority in poverty alleviation programs. Women belonging to the economically underprivileged section of the society; in particular, are often overworked and underpaid. The emerging technologies are largely knowledge intensive and hence the transfer of knowledge and market driven skills can become the most powerful instrument for fighting poverty and deprivation.

Four, equal attention should be focused on the problems of the rural and urban poor. Lack of livelihood opportunities in rural areas leads to the proliferation of urban slums. Damage to common property resources in village results in the growth of environmental refugees. Since in many developing countries agriculture, including crop and animal husbandry, forestry, fisheries and agro-processing, provides most of the jobs and income from diminishing per capita land, water and non-renewable energy sources can be met only through agricultural intensification, diversification and value addition. Integrated, intensive farming systems, which are ecologically sustainable, are needed for this purpose.  

Finally, an evergreen revolution of the kind described above can be imparted a self-propelling and self-replicating momentum only if it is based on the self-mobilization of the people. In all externally funded and introduced development projects, there should be a built-in-withdrawal strategy, so that  the programme does not collapse when the external inputs are withdrawn.

Lastly, the final milestone: A hunger-free world. Studies at MSSRF have shown that by adding a horizontal dimension to numerous vertically structured programs and by promoting a coalition of all concerned with ending hunger and deprivation, it is now possible to provide opportunities for a healthy and productive life for all.

Development which is not equitable will not be sustainable in the long term. A hunger-free and more equitable world is essential for our planet remaining ever blue. Given appropriate eco-technologies and public policies, there are now great opportunities for a better common present and future for all members of the human family.

Source : The Hindu No.3, 1996