The Man Who Fed The World

The Man Who Fed The World is the biography of Dr. Norman Borlaug, Nobel Peace Prize laureate and US national hero, who saved over a billion lives by dedicating his own to ending world hunger and leading the green revolution, which helped get agriculture to a point where it can feed the world.

Scientists, almost by definition, love to dabble. They theorize, hypothesize, ponder, think and strategize, and try to come up with incremental improvements to existing ideas. This extensive cycling within the scientific method is important, but when it comes to solving such an immediate threat as world hunger, well, as Borlaug would say: “You can’t eat potential.”

That’s why he always pushed to get new farming techniques and higher-yielding crop seeds into the hands of farmers as fast as possible, even if they weren’t perfect. Hunger doesn’t wait for anyone, so the only way to fight it was to launch imperfect solutions.

For example in India, small-scale farmers were stuck in their traditions, making government incentives to use new seeds necessary, as well as companies offering free fertilizer at the right time – so Borlaug pushed hard for both of these things, fully aware that he’d come up with better seeds in the future.

Look at your own life. How many times have you published, launched or handed in something that you didn’t think was perfect at the time and actually regretted it? Chances are, in most cases you were glad you did release it, as there was plenty of time to improve it later.

When I look back at over 300 book summaries in 2016, none of which were perfect when I published them, it becomes abundantly clear to me that shipping now is always the better choice.

How would you feel if I suddenly walked into your office tomorrow morning and tell you how you can do your job better? “Keep your folders here, save some time by batching email processing there, and oh, about your browser…” You’d probably tell me to shut up and show me the door – and rightfully so! If I haven’t earned your respect, why would you listen to me? To all the farmers Borlaug worked with, he advocated that they go on a farm, work there and get their hands dirty. Otherwise, how could they possibly understand agriculture, learn the language of farmers and earn the right to talk to them? Doing the hard work of a farmer themselves is the only way for scientists’ later advice to be accepted. This is true for any field, really. If you want the respect of a community and really make a difference in it, don’t sit around and hand out advice based…