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CIMMYT is committed to improving livelihoods
in developing countries. Through strong science and
effective partnerships, we create, share, and use knowledge
and technology to increase food security, improve the
productivity and profitability of farming systems, and
sustain natural resources.
CIMMYT is a non-profit research and training
center with direct links to about 100 developing countries
through offices in Asia, Africa, and Latin America. We participate
in an extensive global network of people and organizations
who share similar development goals, including the public
and private sector, non-governmental and civil society organizations,
relief and health agencies, farmers, and the development assistance
community.
The abbreviation "CIMMYT" derives
from the Spanish version of our name: Centro Internacional
de Mejoramiento de Maíz y Trigo.
 Origins
CIMMYT grew out of a pilot program
in Mexico in 1943, sponsored by the Government of Mexico
and the Rockefeller Foundation. The world had seen what
expertise in plant breeding had accomplished for the
USA in the wake of widespread crop failure, hunger,
and poverty during the Great Depression. Could similar
expertise benefit Mexico and other nations?
The project developed into an innovative,
sustained collaboration with Mexican and international
researchers. It established international networks to
test experimental varieties. One of its researchers,
Norman Borlaug, developed shorter wheat varieties that
put more energy into grain production and responded
better to fertilizer than older varieties. By the late
1950s, Mexico was self-sufficient in wheat production.
Mexico’s success inspired project researchers
to become fierce and effective advocates for the Mexican
innovation model in other countries. In 1966, having
survived one poor harvest but facing another, India
took the extraordinary step of importing 18,000 tons
of wheat seed from Mexico. The first evidence of success
was the Indian wheat harvest of 16.5 million tons in
1968, compared with 11.3 million tons in 1967. Pakistan
also began importing Mexican wheats. These two countries
doubled wheat production between 1966 and 1971. The
Green Revolution—which had by now extended to
rice—had begun.
The social and economic achievements
of the Green Revolution were recognized worldwide when
the Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to Norman Borlaug
in 1970. The following year, a small cadre of development
organizations, national sponsors, and private foundations
organized the Consultative Group on International Agricultural
Research (CGIAR) to spread the impact of research to
more crops and nations. CIMMYT was one of the first
international research centers to be supported through
the CGIAR.
World Hunger, Poverty,
and How CIMMYT Helps
Hunger and Poverty
Most of the world’s poor rely
on agriculture for income and sustenance. Globally,
there is enough food for everyone. Locally, hundreds
of millions of people lack the resources to grow or
buy enough food. Many cannot grow crops in environmentally
safe ways.
The numbers tell the story:
- Population in the least developed
countries will grow by 2.3% annually from 2000-2015,
but arable land area will not increase significantly
- Almost 3 billion live in poverty
- 815 million people suffer from
hunger
- Half of all children in the poorest
countries are malnourished
- By the year 2025, more than 2.8
billion people will suffer from a lack of water
The United Nations Millennium Declaration
(September 2000) pledges to halve the number of people
suffering from extreme poverty and hunger by 2015. It
also commits the world to reducing environmental degradation.
CIMMYT’s work speeds progress towards meeting
these goals.
 Why
Do Maize and Wheat Matter for Sustainable Development?
There are many ways to foster development,
such as building roads, schools, and health facilities.
Maize and wheat research—the area of CIMMYT’s
expertise—is an important path to development,
because maize and wheat are pivotal to nutrition, health,
income, and environmental sustainability in low-income
countries:
- Seventy percent of the world’s
poorest people live in the countryside. Many depend
on farming, especially of maize and wheat, for food
and income.
- According to FAO, maize and wheat
account for about 40% of the world’s food and
25% of calories consumed in developing countries.
- Millions of people—including
poor people in urban areas—get more than half
of their daily calories from maize and wheat alone.
- Maize and wheat occupy almost
200 million hectares in developing countries. We must
grow these crops in environmentally responsible ways,
or the results could be devastating.
- To meet the need for food, developing
countries will need 368 million additional tons of
maize and wheat by 2020 (today, they need about 700
million tons).
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How CIMMYT Helps
We develop better seed
and cropping practices
Improved maize and wheat seed can produce plants that
naturally resist diseases and pests, tolerate too much
or too little water, overcome the limitations of poor
soils, survive excessive cold or heat, offer more nutrition,
are more marketable, and yield more grain for food or
sale. Better cropping practices save water, land, and
other natural resources, aside from raising yields.
 We
help the world conserve and use the great diversity in maize,
wheat, and related species
Through our genebank, important worldwide collections of maize
and wheat are held in trust for future generations. The genes
in these seeds will help solve emerging food production problems,
such as those caused by climate change.
We build capacity and
share knowledge to promote development
We train and mentor researchers. We teach farm households
and rural communities to use new farming practices and
produce seed. We provide technical information and support
that helps researchers, policymakers, and development
workers worldwide. We advocate appropriate policies
to foster food and income security. Results of our research
are widely shared and publicly available.
We speed the recovery
from natural disasters and civil strife
We advise government agencies, relief organizations,
and health organizations about appropriate seed and
cropping practices to help farm households recover from
famine, drought, floods, war, and other disasters. We
help nations restore agricultural research material
and infrastructure. These activities reduce the threat
of continuing food shortages and long-term dependence
on food aid.
Impact of Our Work
- Wheat varieties bred at CIMMYT and its
predecessor organization prevented famine and hunger in
South Asia and elsewhere in the world. The benefits of this
Green Revolution were recognized through the 1970 Nobel
Peace Prize.
 More
nutritious maize varieties developed by CIMMYT won recognition
through the 2000 World Food Prize.- Recent estimates indicate that wheat
varieties developed by CIMMYT and its partners are planted
on more than 64 million hectares in developing countries,
representing more than 75% of the area planted to modern
wheat varieties in those countries.
- Maize varieties developed by CIMMYT
and its partners are planted on nearly half of the area
sown to improved varieties in non-temperate areas of the
developing world.
- As reported in Science (v. 300: 758-62),
in the absence of CGIAR Centers such as CIMMYT, with their
many partners in the developing world, crop yields in developing
countries would have been 19.5-23.5% lower; prices for food
crops would have been 35-66% higher; imports would be 27-30%
higher; calorie intake would have been 13.3-14.4% lower;
and 32-42 million more children would have been malnourished.
The area planted to crops would be 4% higher for wheat and
2% for maize.
- Lower food prices extend the benefits
of agricultural research to poor consumers in urban areas
and landless people in rural areas (and even to the industrialized
world).
- If the developing world attempted to
meet its food requirements in 1995 without the improved
varieties of food crops developed since the Green Revolution,
an additional 426 million hectares of cropped area would
be needed (a five-fold increase over cropped area in 1965).
- This land savings helped to preserve
forested and environmentally fragile lands and to reduce
greenhouse gas emissions by 35%. A higher concentration
of greenhouse gases might have caused climate change to
begin sooner.
Staffing and
Funding
CIMMYT achieves its mission with about 100
specialized research staff and 500 support staff from about
40 countries. The Center is funded by international and regional
development agencies, national governments, private foundations,
and the private sector. Major recent supporters include the
World Bank, the USA, Switzerland, the European Commission,
the Rockefeller Foundation, and Japan. Considerable resources
are also provided by the governments of Mexico and other countries
that host CIMMYT staff. We are especially grateful for unrestricted
and long-term funding, which encourages flexibility and innovation
in research.
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