Congratulations to Ronnie Coffman, professor of plant breeding & genetics and director of CALS International Programs (IP-CALS), on being awarded the inaugural World Agriculture Prize by the Global Confederation of Higher Education Associations for Agricultural and Life Sciences at a ceremony this weekend in Nanjing, China. Coffman was honored for his 40+ year career as a scientist, educator and academic leader working to ensure global food security through agricultural innovation, from his efforts as a rice breeder at the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) in the 1970s, to his work today as the leader of the Borlaug Global Rust Initiative and the Durable Rust Resistance in Wheat project, which are helping combat new strains of wheat rust that threaten to devastate world food supplies.
Dean Boor, who nominated Coffman for the prize, said “Ronnie excels as an agent of change. He has spent his career ensuring that people with scarce resources in some of the world’s most populous countries have access to the agricultural science they need to produce crops best adapted to the challenges they face.”
The prize comes with a $50,000 cash award that Coffman has pledged to donate to AWARE (Advancing Women in Agriculture Through Research and Education), a new initiative to ensure that gender is considered in all IP-CALS activities, from events to funding proposals.
“Women hold the greatest potential to make significant impacts in rural development,” said Coffman. “Colleges of agriculture and life sciences need to empower women as future champions around the globe so they can become the entrepreneurs of their own future as well as the planet’s.”
