Norman Uphoff
Professor Uphoff has been teaching at Cornell University since 1970 after completing his PhD at Berkeley. He has served as chair of Cornell's Rural Development Committee 1971-90, then director of the Cornell International Institute for Food, Agriculture and Development 1990-2005, and is currently director of the Cornell Institute for Public Affairs. After several decades of involvement with agricultural and rural development worldwide as an applied social science, since 1999 he has become increasingly engaged with agroecological innovation, with particular attention to the roles of microorganisms in plant health and performance. He has been studying, evaluating and communicating about the System of Rice Intensification (SRI) since 1997 and now works with the more inclusive System of Crop Intensification (SCI). These management systems are raising crop yields with less reliance on external inputs, evoking better phenotypes from available genotypes. They also give crops more protection against adverse effects of climate change by making modifications in how plants, soil, water and nutrients are managed. SRI benefits have now been demonstrated in >50 countries.