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May 2012 Newsletter

In This Issue
2012 Laureate Announcement Ceremony Scheduled for June 12
Related Events in Washington D.C.
World Food Prize Co-Sponsors Chicago Council Symposium
World Food Prize Hall of Laureates Now Open to Public
First Iowa Youth Institute a Success
21 Students Selected as Borlaug-Ruan International Interns this Summer
Intern Spotlight: Dr. Abbey Avery Canon
Call for Nominations: New Borlaug Field Award for Young Scientists

2012 Laureate Announcement Ceremony Scheduled for

June 12 at U.S. State Department

Secretary Clinton will speak at the event
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton will speak at 2012 Laureate Announcement

The World Food Prize will announce this year's Laureate in a ceremony on Tuesday, June 12, at 10:30 a.m. at the U.S. State Department in Washington, D.C. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton will deliver keynote remarks at the announcement ceremony.
 
The announcement will be hosted by Under Secretary for Economic Growth, Energy, and the Environment, Robert D. Hormats. Amb. Kenneth M. Quinn will also speak. The World Food Prize is honored to hold this ceremony at the U.S. State Department for the ninth consecutive year, and strives to bring international attention to the issue of food security, and to highlight individuals from around the globe who have advanced human development by increasing the quality, quantity or availability of food in the world.
 
The 2012 Laureate will receive the $250,000 World Food Prize at the official Laureate Award Ceremony at the Iowa State Capitol on October 18. The award will be presented as part of the 2012 Borlaug Dialogue international symposium, the theme of which is "Partnerships and Priorities: Transforming the Global Food Security Agenda."
 
Further details about this year's events will be available on our website after the announcement. We will share news about the 2012 Laureate Announcement on our website, Facebook and Twitter.
Related Events in Washington D.C.
2011 Wallace-Carver Interns Meet with Secretary Vilsack

 

The World Food Prize will welcome 17 students in Washington, D.C. during the week of June 11 for the second annual USDA Wallace-Carver Internship program.

 

These students have gone through the rigorous World Food Prize youth programs, and have been selected to serve as USDA interns across the country this summer, where they will collaborate with world-renowned scientists and policymakers. Learn more about the program at this link.

 

Also that week, the World Food Prize Foundation will co-sponsor the AAAS Charles Valentine Riley Memorial Lecture once again this year, on June 14, 2012. The keynote this year will be given by Dr. Rob Horsch, Deputy Director for Research & Development at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. A panel discussion will follow, moderated by Dr. Catherine Woteki, Under Secretary for Research, Education, and Economics, U.S. Department of Agriculture; panelists include The Honorable Bill Northey, Secretary, Iowa Department of Agriculture. Learn more or register to attend here at this link.

 

World Food Prize Co-Sponsors Chicago Council Global Agricultural Symposium

 

The World Food Prize was proud to be a co-sponsor of today's Chicago Council Global Agricultural Symposium, where President Obama spoke this morning, along with many other renowned experts. Photos from the event can be viewed here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/thechicagocouncil  

 

In addition, Amb. Kenneth M. Quinn, president of the World Food Prize Foundation, authored a guest column for the Global Food for Thought blog leading up to the event, titled "Norman Borlaug's Spirit Hovers Above G8 Leaders." The article can be read at this link.

World Food Prize Hall of Laureates Open for Tours, Events 

 

 
World Food Prize Hall of Laureates

 

The World Food Prize Hall of Laureates is now open for public tours, and is scheduling private events including business meetings and conferences, dinners and receptions, weddings and other special events.The Hall of Laureates served as the location for the USDA's first U.S.-China High-Level Agricultural Symposium during a visit from Chinese Vice President Xi Jinping, and has 100 special events scheduled so far this year.   

 

This magnificent, historic edifice tells the stories of Dr. Norman Borlaug, the World Food Prize Laureates, the history of agriculture and our humanitarian heritage.  

 

The Hall of Laureates is open to the public, free of charge, during the following hours:
  • Tuesdays: 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. Visitors may join docent-guided tours on the hour at 9 a.m., 10 a.m., 11 a.m. and noon.
  • Saturdays: 8 a.m. to noon. Visitors may explore the building during self-guided tours, and docents will be available in each room to explain the hall's many features and storytelling elements.
A $1 million installation of interactive educational exhibits is expected to open this fall. Learn more online at www.worldfoodprize.org/hall

 

First Iowa Youth Institute a Success

 

Iowa Youth Institute at ISU

Over 300 people gathered on April 30, 2012, for the first annual World Food Prize Iowa Youth Institute at Iowa State University, including more than 140 high school students from across the state, 90 teachers and dozens of experts from government, business and industry, and academia.  Iowa Gov. Terry Branstad, Lt. Gov. Kim Reynolds, ISU President Steven Leath and Pioneer Hi-Bred President Paul Schickler all spoke at the event.

 

The day was made possible by a generous personal donation from Paul and Claudia Schickler. The goal was to inspire high school students early on to explore careers in science, especially in food and agriculture. Students wrote a 5-page essay on a food security topic, presented it to a panel of local experts and leaders, and toured ISU research facilities and interacted with professors and researchers to learn about a wide array of career paths. The top students will be invited to the World Food Prize Global Youth Institute in October.


View photos from the event at this link.

Record number of Borlaug-Ruan International Interns go Abroad this Summer

Intern Sydney Schrider interacts with
a woman in Kenya


A record number of high school students - 21 students from 10 states - have been selected as Borlaug-Ruan International Interns this summer. They will depart within the next month for 8-week, all-expenses-paid internships at agricultural research centers around the globe. 

 

These students will travel to Africa, Asia, Latin America and the Middle East to learn from and work with professionals on projects dedicated to reducing poverty and hunger,  such as: fisheries and aquaculture studies; biotechnology; micro-credit and the women's self-help concept; the influence of education on household food security; and the calculation of Vitamin C concentration in numerous potato varieties.

 

Learn more about the program and these students at this link.

The World Food Prize Launches Careers

Intern Spotlight: Dr. Abbey Avery Canon

 

Abbey measures children to track nutritional health in Ghana
Abbey Avery Canon, originally from Rowan, Iowa, completed a World Food Prize international internship in 2004 in Ethiopia. Her path has led her to work for the Centers for Disease Control, but her story shows how she was launched into an array of incredible opportunities.
 
In high school, I had countless interests that included academics, public speaking, sports, FFA, 4-H, choir, agriculture, animals and reading books about African diseases.  I graduated high school as an active, educated, well-rounded person, but there were far too many subjects I liked to be able to choose a career!
 
Although international issues had always interested me, it took a 2004 World Food Prize Borlaug-Ruan Internship at the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) in Ethiopia to direct and refine my interests into an academic path and eventual career in veterinary public health. This unique internship taught me about the essential connection between human and animal health.

My project at ILRI focused on human nutrition and access to animal source foods. My extraordinary Ethiopian "mother," Tigist, not only treated me as part of her family, but also guided me through her breathtaking country. During a brief trip to a national park, Tigist directed me into a rural homestead. As she stood in the dim and damp hut holding one of the smallest residents on her hip, she pointed and explained that the one and only room made from sticks, dried manure, and mud was home to not only a large family, but also to their young chicken flock that scattered across the dirt floor. Looking past the crowded room, I saw the dependency of the family on their chicken flock, and became keenly aware of the intricate health relationship between humans and animals in developing countries.
 
Following my summer in Ethiopia, I worked in Ghana with the ENAM (Enhancing Child Nutrition through Animal Source Food Management) project as a continuation of my work in Ethiopia. There, I collected anthropometric data from children to determine the physical effects of including, or excluding by lack of resources, animal source foods from their diets.  
 
I graduated from Iowa State University in 2007 with a Bachelor of Science with majors in Animal Science and International Agriculture, then continued on to study veterinary science there. Although I did not travel overseas during vet school, I had some very rewarding opportunities. I held an American Association of Swine Veterinarians internship with Cargill Pork and completed an E. coli diagnostics project for which I was selected as a student speaker for the national meeting.  Based on my desire to further my international agriculture skills, I participated in the Smith-Kilborne Program at Plum Island in New York, focusing on diagnostics and response to foreign animal disease crises. 

After graduating in May 2011 with a Doctor of Veterinary Medicine from Iowa State, I went to Colorado to complete my Masters of Public Health by working with a rural county health department. There, I led a countywide education campaign against rabies and developed other educational material about zoonoses for the public.  
 
My World Food Prize Internship laid the foundation eight years ago for a journey that has brought me to an exciting new career opportunity. I received a two-year appointment as an Epidemic Intelligence Service Officer (EISO) with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), and will be stationed at the Montana State Health Department where I will also be acting as Montana's State Public Health Veterinarian. As a uniformed member of the United States Public Health Service, my responsibility will be to protect, promote, and advance the health and safety of our Nation. Our health challenges will take shape in many different forms throughout the next two years, and I look forward to serving veterinary public health in whatever capacity I am needed.
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Nominate Now:

New Borlaug Field Award for Young Scientists

 

 
Dr. Norman Borlaug

The World Food Prize Foundation is seeking nominations for the new Norman Borlaug Award for Field Research and Application, Endowed by the Rockefeller Foundation.  

 

This new award will be presented during the World Food Prize events this October.


This award will recognize exceptional, science-based achievement in international agriculture and food production by an individual under 40 who has clearly demonstrated intellectual courage, stamina and determination in the fight to eliminate global hunger and poverty.


The $10,000 award will honor an individual who is working closely and directly "in the field" or at the production or processing level with farmers, animal herders, fishers or others in rural communities, in any discipline or enterprise across the entire food production, processing, and distribution chain.

 

To learn more and to nominate a deserving individual, please visit

this website. 

 

Nominations are due June 30, 2012.

 

 

  

Upcoming Events:

 

May 24: Amb. Kenneth M. Quinn, President of the World Food Prize, will deliver the University of Minnesota's Siehl Prize Lecture. 

 

June 12: World Food Prize Laureate Announcement Ceremony, 10:30 a.m. at the U.S. State Department.

 

June 14: AAAS Riley Memorial Lecture in Washington, D.C.  

 

June 26: Amb. Kenneth M. Quinn, president of the World Food Prize Foundation, will award the Borlaug Medallion to APLU on its 150th anniversary. 


June 30: Nomination Deadline for the Norman Borlaug Award for Field Research and Application, Endowed by the Rockefeller Foundation.