Authors

Dr. Cary Fowler is the Executive Director of The Global Crop Diversity Trust, a unique public-private partnership to establish an endowment fund that will provide complete and continuous funding for key crop collections, in eternity. He was Professor and Director of Research in the Department for International Environment & Development Studies at the Norwegian University of Life Sciences. He was also a Senior Advisor to the Director General of Bioversity International. In this latter role, he represented the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR) in negotiations on the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture. In 1985, he was awarded the Right Livelihood Award (the "Alternative Nobel Prize”). In the 1990s, he headed the International Conference and Programme on Plant Genetic Resources at the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), which produced the UN's first ever global assessment of the state of the world's plant genetic resources. He received a 2010 Heinz Award for his "vision and efforts in the preservation of the world's food supply".