The Early Years
The CGIAR arose in response to the widespread concern in the mid-20th century that rapid increases in human populations would soon lead to widespread famine. Starting in 1943, the Rockefeller Foundation and the Mexican government laid the seeds for the Green Revolution when they established the Office of Special Studies, which became the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) in 1963. CIMMYT and the International Rice Research Institute, established in 1960 with support from the Rockefeller Foundation and Ford Foundation, developed high-yielding, disease-resistant varieties that dramatically increased production of these staple cereals, and turned India, for example, from a country regularly facing starvation in the 1960s to a net exporter of cereals by the late 1970s. But it was clear that these foundations alone could not fund all the agricultural research and development efforts needed to feed the world's population. In 1969, the Pearson Commission on International Development urged the international community to undertake "intensive international effort" to support "research specializing in food supplies and tropical agriculture".
In 1970, the Rockefeller Foundation proposed a worldwide network of agricultural research centers under a permanent secretariat. This was further supported and developed by the World Bank, FAO and UNDP, and the CGIAR was established on May 19, 1971, to coordinate international agricultural research efforts aimed at reducing poverty and achieving food security in developing countries.
The CGIAR originally supported four centres: CIMMYT, IRRI, the International Center for Tropical Agriculture (CIAT) and the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA). The initial focus on the staple cereals, rice, wheat and maize, widened during the 1970s to include cassava, chickpea, sorghum, potato, millet and other food crops, and encompassed livestock, farming systems, the conservation of genetic resources, plant nutrition, water management, policy research, and services to national agricultural research centers in developing countries. By 1983 there were 13 research centers around the world under its umbrella.
Read more about this topic: CGIAR, Brief History
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