Wealth Biz Buzz

While Wealth Biz Buzz is dedicated to the Wealth Management business for our Against the Odds series we are going outside that box by celebrating the lives of those unsung heroes who have made meaningful contributions to our world.

The impetus is simple; I am bored of hearing about Charlie Sheen, tuning-in to see what team Lebron picks, watching Lindsay Lohan parade into court or catching glimpses of Miley Cyrus and Michael Phelps taking bong hits.

I am simply in a phase were I choose not to waste any gray matter on such tripe; particularly, because I am utterly fascinated by the stories of people, with little renown or panache that have given so much to so many.

So it is within this context that we launch our series.  We urge you to share with us some of those people who you admire, who tirelessly helped others or triumphed in overcoming countless hurdles on their path to success.  There are some amazing stories out there and we want to hear them and to share them.  Drop a name, we’ll do the research and post it, or tell us the whole story.  Either way, let’s get the word out together, that we want to celebrate, respect, admire and support those who make meaningful contributions (and that’s not Lady GaGa channeling Madonna).

Dr. Norman E. Borlaug

With that prelude, it is befitting that we start our series with Dr. Norman Borlaug, a guy who literally saved hundreds of millions of lives.

The long and short of it is that Dr. Borlaug was a plant scientist who taught the world to feed itself.

His breeding of high-yielding crop varieties helped to avert mass famines that were widely predicted in the 1960’s, altering the course of history.

In 1970, at 56 years of age, Dr. Norman Ernest Borlaug was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

“More than any other single person of this age, he has helped provide bread for a hungry world”, the Nobel committee said in presenting him with the Peace Prize.  “We have made this choice in hope that providing bread will also give the world peace”.

His was an unlikely career path, one that began in earnest near the end of World War II when he walked away from a promising job at DuPont to take a position in Mexico trying to help farmers improve their crops.

Indeed, on first seeing the situation in Mexico, Dr. Borlaug reacted with near despair.  “These places, I’ve seen have clubbed my mind – they are so poor and depressing.  I don’t know what we can do to help these people, but we have got to do something”, he wrote his wife after his first extended sojourn in the country.

The next few years were ones of toil and privation as Dr. Borlaug and his colleagues, with scant funds or equipment, set to work improving yields in tropical crop varieties.

He spent countless hours hunched over in the blazing Mexican sun as he manipulated tiny wheat blossoms to cross different strains. To speed the work, he set up winter and summer operations in far-flung parts of Mexico, logging thousands of miles over poor roads. He battled illness, forded rivers in flood, dodged mudslides and slept in tents.

One of his most remarkable discoveries was the creation of a semi-dwarf wheat plant.  Through this breakthrough, he was able to develop a strain of wheat to favor shorter, stronger stalks that could better support larger seed heads without “lodging” (a trait taller wheat grasses have of collapsing under the weight of the extra grain induced by nitrogen fertilizer).

As word of his success in Mexico spread, he began receiving requests for help from across the globe.  On the Indian subcontinent in particular, a crisis developed. The population was growing so much faster than farm output that it was not clear how the masses could be fed. In the mid-1960s, huge grain imports were required to prevent starvation.

With the help of Dr. Borlaug and his team, this crisis was averted, as he taught these countries how to feed themselves and eliminate their dependency on foreign wheat.

Dr. Borlaug died of complications of cancer in September of 2009 at the age of 95.

So kiss the “goddesses” Charlie, bounce your ball Lebron and don another absurd costume GAGA; your fame and fortune are great diversions and have there place, but for now, I choose to celebrate the contributions of a man who averted famine and wars and fed billions of starving people by adhering to a simple kernel of advice from his grandfather  (an Iowan farmer) “ Your wiser to feed your head now , if you want to feed your belly later on.”

Who’s your unsung hero?