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2009 World Food Prize Laureate, Dr. Gebisa Ejeta

May 14, 2010

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Read about the 2009 World Food Prize Laureate, Dr. Gebisa Ejeta.

By Cole Waggoner, Managing Editor

On October 15, 2009 at the Iowa State Capitol in Des Moines, Iowa, Ethiopian scientist Dr. Gebisa Ejeta, a professor at Purdue University, was formally awarded the World Food Prize. The prize is an international award that recognizes one individual or group each year who have made major developments in increasing the quantity or quality of food available around the world. Dr. Norman Borlaug – often referred to as the father of the green revolution – wanted to create a prize to honor those who make major, measureable contributions with regard to enhancing food supplies around the world. Borlaug’s vision became a reality: the first World Food Prize was awarded in 1986.

Dr. Ejeta, was recognized for his work in developing sorghum hybrids, one of the world’s major grains that is now resistant to drought and a rampant weed. These enhancements to sorghum have particularly improved the lives of those living in sub-Saharan Africa.

After graduating from Ethiopia’s Alemaya College with a degree in plant science and later receiving a Ph.D. from Purdue University in plant breeding and genetics, Ejeta spent two decades in Sudan working to create a type of sorghum that could produce yields five to ten times greater than normal sorghum. His first hybrid sorghum was introduced in 1983; his crop produced yields that exceed local sorghum yields by 150 percent. Ejeta then began to explore Striga, a weed that regularly threatens crop productivity in Ejeta’s native country, Ethiopia, among other areas throughout Africa. Working with his colleagues at Purdue, he successfully bred a collection of Striga-resistant sorghum plants.

In a USA Today article, Ejeta noted that sorghum feeds anywhere from 500 million to 700 million individuals around the globe. “It’s a huge crop in Africa; it’s a very important crop in India. In China it’s used for making their national alcoholic beverage,” baijiu, or white liquor, he said, according to the piece. In addition to food and alcohol, sorghum is used in the production of animal feed, bird seed and even biofuels.

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