Achievement

Relevance of Climate Change Science to Political Policy: Trainee from policy science wrote a research paper that examined the role of climate and climate science (e.g., an El Nino event in 1972) in understanding the Soviet wheat crop failure in 1972/73, the US decision to sell wheat to the Soviets to meet the gap, the controversy surrounding that decision’s impact on wheat prices in the US, and the resulting changes in US farm policy designed by then US Agricultural Secretary Earl Butz to encourage farmers to get big, or get out. The consequences of this shift in US farm policy continue to today and have implications for US agriculture that will play out as climate change occurs.