From working collections to the World Germplasm Project: agricultural modernization and genetic conservation at the Rockefeller Foundation

This paper charts the history of the Rockefeller Foundation’s participation in the collection and long-term preservation of genetic diversity in crop plants from the 1940s through the 1970s. In the decades following the launch of its agricultural program in Mexico in 1943, the Rockefeller Foundation figured prominently in the creation of world collections of key economic crops. Through the efforts of its administrators and staff, the foundation subsequently parlayed this experience into a leadership role in international efforts to conserve so-called plant genetic resources. Previous accounts of the Rockefeller Foundation’s interventions in international agricultural development have focused on the outcomes prioritized by foundation staff and administrators as they launched assistance programs and especially their characterization of the peoples and ‘‘problems’’ they encountered abroad. This paper highlights instead how foundation administrators and staff responded to a newly emergent international agricultural concern—the loss of crop genetic diversity. Charting the foundation’s responses to this concern, which developed only after agricultural modernization had begun and was understood to be produced by the successes of the foundation’s own agricultural assistance programs, allows for greater interrogation of how the foundation understood and projected its central position in international agricultural research activities by the 1970s.Research for this article was supported in part by a grant-in-aid from the Rockefeller Archive Center

Environmental movements in space-time: the Czech and Slovak republics from Stalinism to post-socialism

To demonstrate the role of space and time in social movements, the paper analyses the evolution and context of the environmental movement in the Czech and Slovak republics from 1948 to 1998. It shows that the movement's identity was formed under socialism and that political opportunity and resource availability changed markedly over time, as did its organisational and spatial structure. The movement played a significant part in the collapse of the socialist regime, but in the 1990s was marginalised in the interests of building a market economy and an independent Slovakia. Nevertheless a diverse and flexible range of groups existed by the late 1990s. The successive space-times allow analysis of the multiple and changing variables that influence the geography of social movements

Keeping secrets from parents: Advantages and disadvantages of secrecy in adolescence.

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Biotechnology and the Politics of Truth : From the Green Revolution to an Evergreen Revolution

This paper investigates why and how issues around the diffusion of GM technologies and products to developing countries have become so central to a debate which has shifted away from technical issues of cost-benefit optimisation in a context of uniform mass production and consumption in the North, to the moral case for GM crops to feed the hungry and aid ‘development’ in the South. Using comparison between agricultural biotechnology and the ‘Green Revolution’ as a cross cutting theme, the contributions of this paper are threefold. Firstly, by analysing biotechnology as a set of overlapping frames within a discursive formation, four frames are identified which summarise key challenges presented by biotechnology era. Secondly, the use of Foucault's concept of bio-power to synthesise key themes from the frame analysis illuminates the ‘revolutionary’ nature of the biotech revolution. Thirdly, the potential of actor-network theory to provide a tools for the empirical study of processes of (re)negotiation of nature/society relations in the context of agricultural biotechnology controversies is explored

Institutional context and governance of Peruvian fisheries and aquaculture

This report summarizes and describes the main state-driven processes related to the governance of the coastal fisheries and (marine) aquaculture sectors (i.e. mariculture) in Peru. It was produced in the frame of the Peruvian-German Humboldt Tipping project (Social-Ecological Tipping Points of the Northern Humboldt Current Upwelling System, Economic Repercussions and Governance Strategies) funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF). The project aims to assess the risk of decreased marine ecosystem productivity as a turning point for the ecological, economic and social systems that are interconnected under the Humboldt Current Upwelling System (HCUS). Within this framework, the artec Sustainability Research Center of the University of Bremen is responsible for the working package which focuses on transdisciplinary science and the analysis of the repercussions of environmental changes for marine governance regimes in Peru (WP 7).22

Envisioning 2050 : Climate Change, Aquaculture and Fisheries in West Africa, Dakar, Senegal, 14-16th April 2010

French version available in IDRC Digital Library: Vision 2050 : Changement climatique, pêche et aquaculture en Afrique de l’Ouest, du 14 au 16 avril 2010, Dakar, SénégalThis report presents the activities and results of the workshop Envisioning 2050: Climate Change, Aquaculture and Fisheries in West Africa. The objectives of the workshop were to discuss critical issues and uncertainties faced by the fisheries and aquaculture sector in Ghana, Senegal and Mauritania, build sectoral scenarios for 2050 and discuss the implication of these scenarios in the context of climate change for the countries and the region. During the workshop participants were introduced to scenariobuilding methodologies, identified drivers of change and ranked them according to their importance and levels of uncertainty. Participants then constructed four consistent scenarios for 2050 for each country. The scenarios raised several questions including: Can aquaculture address both national food security and macroeconomic growth? Should regional trade be promoted or access to global markets prioritised? How will climate change affect fishery resources, especially small pelagic fish like sardines, which are an important export commodity for Senegal and Mauritania? Participants also assessed the implications of the different scenarios in terms of climate change and research and development in the fisheries and aquaculture sector. It was agreed that a regional or sub-regional effort is needed to better integrate scientific knowledge and to put into place coherent fisheries policies. Additionally, a better understanding of the impacts of climate change on the sector is needed, with for instance, the development of coupled climate-fisheries models for major commercial fisheries in the region. Participants unanimously agreed that strategic planning and foresight studies methodologies should be widely disseminated. Indeed the opportunity for reflective and creative thinking was recognised as an important part of planning - especially adaptation planning - to climate change. Finally, the workshop provided a rare opportunity to include in a foresight study, art projects by youth on the future of the fisheries sector and the coasts as an exhibition and discussion theme (“Visions of the Future: What is African Youth telling us about our Ocean?”). Empowering youth on climate change issues and integrating their needs into adaptation planning is essential as they will be the ones most affected by future developments