Morgan Carrington "Cary" Fowler Jr. (born 1949) is an American agriculturalist and the former executive director of the
Crop Trust
The Crop Trust, officially known as the Global Crop Diversity Trust, is an international nonprofit organization with a secretariat in Bonn, Germany. Its mission is to conserve and make available the world's crop diversity for food security.
Establ ...
, currently serving as a senior advisor to the trust. On May 5th, Dr. Fowler joined the
U.S. Department of State
The United States Department of State (DOS), or State Department, is an United States federal executive departments, executive department of the Federal government of the United States, U.S. federal government responsible for the country's fore ...
as U.S. Special Envoy for Global Food Security.
Background
Fowler was born in 1949 to Morgan, a General Sessions judge, and Betty, a dietician.
He graduated from
White Station High School
White Station High School is a four-year public high school located in Memphis, Tennessee.
White Station High is a member of the Shelby County Schools system and is recognized as one of the best high schools in the state of Tennessee. U.S. New ...
in Memphis, Tennessee, in 1967, and attended
Rhodes College
Rhodes College is a Private college, private Liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts college in Memphis, Tennessee. Historically affiliated with the Presbyterian Church (USA), it is a member of the Associated Colleges of the Sout ...
in Memphis, but transferred in his
junior year
A junior is person in the third year at an educational institution; usually at a secondary school or at the college and university level, but also in other forms of post-secondary educational institutions. In United States high schools, a junio ...
to
Simon Fraser University
Simon Fraser University (SFU) is a public research university in British Columbia, Canada, with three campuses, all in Greater Vancouver: Burnaby (main campus), Surrey, and Vancouver. The main Burnaby campus on Burnaby Mountain, located from ...
in Canada, earning his
B.A.
Bachelor of arts (BA or AB; from the Latin ', ', or ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate program in the arts, or, in some cases, other disciplines. A Bachelor of Arts degree course is generally completed in three or four yea ...
Honors degree in 1971.
He received a Ph.D. degree in
Sociology
Sociology is a social science that focuses on society, human social behavior, patterns of Interpersonal ties, social relationships, social interaction, and aspects of culture associated with everyday life. It uses various methods of Empirical ...
from
Uppsala University
Uppsala University ( sv, Uppsala universitet) is a public university, public research university in Uppsala, Sweden. Founded in 1477, it is the List of universities in Sweden, oldest university in Sweden and the Nordic countries still in opera ...
in Sweden.
Fowler was active in
civil rights
Civil and political rights are a class of rights that protect individuals' freedom from infringement by governments, social organizations, and private individuals. They ensure one's entitlement to participate in the civil and political life of ...
demonstrations in Memphis. He was present at the
Mason Temple
Mason Temple, located in Memphis, Tennessee, is a Christian international sanctuary and central headquarters of the Church of God in Christ, the largest African American Pentecostal group in the world. The building was named for Bishop Charles H ...
on April 3, 1968, when
Martin Luther King Jr.
Martin Luther King Jr. (born Michael King Jr.; January 15, 1929 – April 4, 1968) was an American Baptist minister and activist, one of the most prominent leaders in the civil rights movement from 1955 until his assassination in 1968 ...
made his last speech, "
". During the
Vietnam War
The Vietnam War (also known by #Names, other names) was a conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. It was the second of the Indochina Wars and was officially fought between North Vie ...
, he obtained
conscientious objector
A conscientious objector (often shortened to conchie) is an "individual who has claimed the right to refuse to perform military service" on the grounds of freedom of thought, conscience, or religion. The term has also been extended to object ...
status and worked at a hospital in North Carolina.
Career
In the 1970s-80s Fowler was Program Director for the National Sharecroppers Fund/Rural Advancement Fund.
Following this, he served as Professor and Director of Research in the Department for International Environment & Development Studies at the
Norwegian University of Life Sciences
The Norwegian University of Life Sciences ( no, Norges miljø- og biovitenskapelige universitet, NMBU) is a public university located in Ås, Norway. It is located at Ås in Viken, near Oslo, and at Adamstuen in Oslo and has around 5,200 stude ...
in
Ås,
Norway
Norway, officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic country in Northern Europe, the mainland territory of which comprises the western and northernmost portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula. The remote Arctic island of Jan Mayen and t ...
. He also led the International Conference and Programme on Plant Genetic Resources at the
Food and Agriculture Organization
The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO)french: link=no, Organisation des Nations unies pour l'alimentation et l'agriculture; it, Organizzazione delle Nazioni Unite per l'Alimentazione e l'Agricoltura is an intern ...
of the United Nations (UN) in the 1990s. There, he produced the UN's first global assessment of the state of the world's crop diversity and was the chief author of the
Food and Agriculture Organization
The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO)french: link=no, Organisation des Nations unies pour l'alimentation et l'agriculture; it, Organizzazione delle Nazioni Unite per l'Alimentazione e l'Agricoltura is an intern ...
's Global Plan of Action for Plant Genetic Resources. He subsequently supervised the negotiations that led to its adoption by 150 countries in 1996.
From 1996 to 2001, Fowler represented the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR) in negotiations for the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources.
In 2010, he played a lead role in saving one of the world's largest living collections of fruit and berry varieties at the Pavlovsk Experiment Station in Russia. In order to save the Station, he led an international campaign of scientists and citizens who voiced their concerns about the threatened conversion of this station to a housing development.
In 2013, Fowler was elected to Membership in the Russian Academy of Sciences, which carries the title of Academician.
He is one of two foreign members of the Academy.
Fowler has also previously served as a Special Assistant to the Secretary General of the World Food Summit, as a board member of the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) in Mexico, as the chair of the board of The Livestock Conservancy, as a member of the
Seed Savers Exchange
Seed Savers Exchange, or SSE, is a non-profit organization based near Decorah, Iowa, that preserves heirloom plant varieties through regeneration, distribution and seed exchange. It is one of the largest nongovernmental seedbanks in the United Stat ...
board, and as a member of the National Plant Genetic Resources Board of the U.S.
Fowler is also a member of the New York Botanical Garden Corporation.
On June 1, 2015, United States President
Barack Obama
Barack Hussein Obama II ( ; born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who served as the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, Obama was the first African-American president of the U ...
announced his intent to appoint Fowler as a Member of the Board for International Food and Agricultural Development.
In April 2017, Fowler was elected Chair of the Board of Trustees of
Rhodes College
Rhodes College is a Private college, private Liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts college in Memphis, Tennessee. Historically affiliated with the Presbyterian Church (USA), it is a member of the Associated Colleges of the Sout ...
.
After being appointed by U.S. President
Joe Biden, Fowler officially join the Office of Global Food Security at the U.S. Department of State on May 5, 2022.
Global Crop Diversity Trust
![Cary Fowler 2007](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/1e/Cary_Fowler_2007.jpg)
Fowler served as the Executive Director of the
Global Crop Diversity Trust
The Crop Trust, officially known as the Global Crop Diversity Trust, is an international nonprofit organization with a secretariat in Bonn, Germany. Its mission is to conserve and make available the world's crop diversity for food security.
Esta ...
from 2005 to 2012.
The trust's mandate is to ensure "the conservation and availability of crop diversity for food security worldwide." Fowler was influential in the creation of the
Svalbard Global Seed Vault
The Svalbard Global Seed Vault ( no, Svalbard globale frøhvelv) is a secure backup facility for the world's crop diversity on the Norwegian island of Spitsbergen in the remote Arctic Svalbard archipelago. The Seed Vault provides long-term stora ...
, which currently houses samples of more than one million distinct crop varieties.
Working with partner genebanks in 71 countries during Fowler's tenure as executive director, the Trust helped rescue 83,393 unique crop varieties from extinction.
It sponsored more than 40 projects to screen crop collections for important traits such as heat and drought tolerance. In partnership with the USDA, a state-of-the-art genebank management system ("GRIN-Global") was developed and made available to 38 genebanks internationally, and the first ever global portal to accession (sample) level information (Genesys)
was launched. The Trust's endowment grew more than $100 million to $134 million, and total funds raised surpassed $200 million.
By the end of Fowler's tenure, the Trust concluded three major agreements intended to protect and conserve crop diversity: with the Millennium Seed Bank of Kew Gardens,
the indigenous communities in the Andes,
and the international genebanks of the Consultive Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR).
He stepped down as Executive Director of the trust in late 2012 but continues to serve in an advisory role and chairs the International Advisory Council of the Svalbard Global Seed Vault.
Awards and honors
Fowler has received several honorary degrees, including an Honorary Doctorate of Law degree from Simon Fraser University,
an Honorary Doctorate of Science degree from Rhodes College,
and an Honorary Doctorate of Humanities degree from
Oberlin College
Oberlin College is a Private university, private Liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts college and conservatory of music in Oberlin, Ohio. It is the oldest Mixed-sex education, coeducational liberal arts college in the United S ...
. He received the
Right Livelihood Award
The Right Livelihood Award is an international award to "honour and support those offering practical and exemplary answers to the most urgent challenges facing us today." The prize was established in 1980 by German-Swedish philanthropist Jakob v ...
with
Pat Mooney
Pat Roy Mooney, for more than thirty years, has worked with civil society organizations on international trade and development issues related to agriculture, biodiversity and emerging technologies.
He was born and lived on the Canadian prairies f ...
in 1985 for his work in
agriculture
Agriculture or farming is the practice of cultivating plants and livestock. Agriculture was the key development in the rise of sedentary human civilization, whereby farming of domesticated species created food surpluses that enabled people to ...
and the preservation of
biodiversity
Biodiversity or biological diversity is the variety and variability of life on Earth. Biodiversity is a measure of variation at the genetic (''genetic variability''), species (''species diversity''), and ecosystem (''ecosystem diversity'') l ...
. Fowler has also received the Vavilov Medal from the Russian Academy of Agricultural Sciences.
In 2010, he was one of ten recipients of the 16th Annual
Heinz Awards
The Heinz Awards are individual achievement honors given annually by the Heinz Family Foundation. The Heinz Awards each year recognize outstanding individuals for their innovative contributions in three areas: the Arts, the Economy and the Enviro ...
with a special focus on global change.
In 2012, he was awarded the "Wind Beneath my Wings" award jointly with his wife
Amy P. Goldman at
Bette Midler
Bette Midler (;''Inside the Actors Studio'', 2004 born December 1, 1945) is an American singer, actress, comedian and author. Throughout her career, which spans over five decades, Midler has received List of awards and nominations received by Be ...
's annual "Hulaween" party. He was the baccalaureate speaker at the 2013 Rhodes College commencement ceremonies and received the 2015 William L. Brown Award for Excellence in Genetic Resource Conservation from the Missouri Botanical Garden.
In 2016 Fowler received the Frank N. Meyer Medal for Plant Genetic Resources, given by the Crop Science Society of America.
He and his wife
Amy Goldman Fowler
Amy Goldman Fowler (born 1954) is an American billionaire heiress, gardener, author, artist, philanthropist, and advocate for seed saving and heirloom fruits and vegetables. She is one of the foremost heirloom plant conservationists in the US. Go ...
jointly received the "Visionary" Award from the
American Visionary Art Museum
The American Visionary Art Museum (AVAM) is an art museum located in Baltimore, Maryland's Federal Hill neighborhood at 800 Key Highway
Maryland Route 2 (MD 2) is the longest state highway in the U.S. state of Maryland. The route runs fro ...
.
Fowler's book ''Seeds on Ice: Svalbard and the Global Seed Vault'' was awarded the 2016
Nautilus Book Award
The nautilus (, ) is a pelagic marine mollusc of the cephalopod family Nautilidae. The nautilus is the sole extant family of the superfamily Nautilaceae and of its smaller but near equal suborder, Nautilina.
It comprises six living species in t ...
Gold Medal for best book in the Ecology/Environment category.
Fowler received the 2018 Thomas Jefferson Medal in Citizen Leadership, awarded jointly by the
University of Virginia
The University of Virginia (UVA) is a Public university#United States, public research university in Charlottesville, Virginia. Founded in 1819 by Thomas Jefferson, the university is ranked among the top academic institutions in the United S ...
and the
Thomas Jefferson Foundation
The Thomas Jefferson Foundation, originally known as the Thomas Jefferson Memorial Foundation, is a private, nonprofit 501(c)(3) corporation founded in 1923 to purchase and maintain Monticello, the primary plantation of Thomas Jefferson, the third ...
, and gave the keynote address at
Monticello
Monticello ( ) was the primary plantation of Founding Father Thomas Jefferson, the third president of the United States, who began designing Monticello after inheriting land from his father at age 26. Located just outside Charlottesville, V ...
on the occasion of
Jefferson's 275th birthday.
Media
Fowler has made many media appearances, including the
CBS
CBS Broadcasting Inc., commonly shortened to CBS, the abbreviation of its former legal name Columbia Broadcasting System, is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the CBS Entertainm ...
news show ''
60 Minutes
''60 Minutes'' is an American television news magazine broadcast on the CBS television network. Debuting in 1968, the program was created by Don Hewitt and Bill Leonard, who chose to set it apart from other news programs by using a unique styl ...
''.
He has been profiled in ''
The New Yorker
''The New Yorker'' is an American weekly magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. Founded as a weekly in 1925, the magazine is published 47 times annually, with five of these issues ...
'' magazine, presented at the Pop!Tech conference and spoken at the
TED
TED may refer to:
Economics and finance
* TED spread between U.S. Treasuries and Eurodollar
Education
* ''Türk Eğitim Derneği'', the Turkish Education Association
** TED Ankara College Foundation Schools, Turkey
** Transvaal Education Depa ...
Global Conference in Oxford.
Fowler was the focus of the 2013 documentary ''Seeds of Time'', directed by director Sandy McLeod.
The film centers on Fowler's work to protect the world's food supply with the
Svalbard Global Seed Vault
The Svalbard Global Seed Vault ( no, Svalbard globale frøhvelv) is a secure backup facility for the world's crop diversity on the Norwegian island of Spitsbergen in the remote Arctic Svalbard archipelago. The Seed Vault provides long-term stora ...
and the challenges facing seed protection and genetic diversity efforts as a result of climate change.
It was produced by J. D. Marlow, Emily Triantaphyllis, and Chiemi Karasawa. ''Seeds of Time'' won the Audience Award at the
San Francisco Green Film Festival
The San Francisco Green Film Festival was an environmental film festival which was held annually from 2011 to 2019.
History
The festival was founded by Rachel Caplan, who had previously worked for the Edinburgh Film Festival, the San Francisc ...
2014, Best Film at the Portland EcoFilm Festival 2014,
and Best Cinematography at the Costa Rica Film Festival (Internacional de Cine) 2014. It was an official selection at
South by Southwest
South by Southwest, abbreviated as SXSW and colloquially referred to as South By, is an annual conglomeration of parallel film, interactive media, and music festivals and Convention (meeting), conferences organized jointly that take place in m ...
2014 and the Full Frame Documentary Film Festival 2014, and has been screened more than 90 times.
Personal life
In 2012, Fowler married author, gardener, and seed saving advocate
Amy P. Goldman. He has two children and is a melanoma and testicular cancer survivor.
Bibliography
In addition to authoring more than 100 articles in various agriculture, law development and biology journals, Fowler has authored and coauthored several books.
*
*
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References
External links
Global Crop Diversity TrustSpeech given at Pop!Tech, 2007Speech given at The Do Lectures, 2008*
*
"One seed at a time, protecting the future of food" (TEDGlobal 2009)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Fowler, Cary
American agronomists
American conservationists
20th-century American botanists
21st-century American botanists
Foreign Members of the Russian Academy of Sciences
Uppsala University alumni
People from Memphis, Tennessee
Scientists from Tennessee
1949 births
Living people
Sol Goldman family