Plateau Perspectives' Council of Reference
Dr Calvin DeWitt,
Professor of Environmental Studies, University of Wisconsin-Madison
Sir Brian Heap CBE
ScD FRS, former Master of St Edmunds College, Cambridge University
Dr John Hodges,
Consultant, formerly with United Nation's Food & Agriculture Organization
Sir John
Polkinghorne KBE FRS, former President of Queens College, Cambridge
University
Sir Ghillean Prance
FRS VMH, former Director of Kew Royal Botanic Gardens
Mr Matthias Stiefel,
Executive Director, WSP International
Mr David Taylor,
Director, USAID Office of Transition Initiatives
Dr Tony Whitten,
Senior Biodiversity Scientist, Biodiversity Group, The World Bank
Professor Calvin DeWitt
Calvin DeWitt is Professor of Environmental Studies, the
Nelson Institute, University of Wisconsin-Madison, and President Emeritus of Au
Sable Institute. He is a physiological ecologist and ecosystems ecologist with a
focus on wetland ecosystems. At Au Sable Institute he developed a program
beginning in 1979 that now serves more than 60 Christian colleges and
universities in North America, India, and Africa with courses in Christian
environmental stewardship.
In the area of interface between ecology and Judeo-Christian environmental
ethics he is co-author (with Sir Ghillean Prance) of Missionary Earthkeeping
(1992) and author of Caring for Creation: Responsible Stewardship of God’s
Handiwork (1997).
Sir Brian Heap CBE ScD FRS
Sir Brian Heap is a former Master of St Edmunds College,
Cambridge University, and a Fellow and Foreign Secretary of The Royal Society.
He is an eminent animal biologist and until recently was Director of the
Babraham Institute, Cambridge, and Director of Science, UK Biotechnology and
Biological Sciences Research Council. He is also the UK representative on the
NATO Science Committee, and has worked with the World Health Organization in
China. Professor Heap holds doctorates from Cambridge, Nottingham and York, has
published extensively and holds distinguished awards for his scientific work.
Dr John Hodges
Dr John Hodges was responsible for animal breeding and
genetic resources in the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the UN where
he had wide experience of development agriculture. Previously he was Professor
of Animal Genetics at the University of British Columbia, Canada and earlier
taught at Cambridge University, UK. He is the former Head of the Production
Division of the Milk Marketing Board of England and Wales. He has degrees in
agriculture, livestock production and genetics from Reading and Cambridge
Universities (UK) and in business administration from Harvard University (USA).
Dr Hodges is co-author of the book Tropical Cattle:
Origins, Breeds and Breeding Policies (1997). Having analysed the history of
genetic gain and livestock in the tropics he recommends an alternative approach
to improving quality of life by greater use of indigenous breeds and working
together with the local cultures of livestock producers.
Since 1990, Dr. Hodges has worked with the governments and
agricultural leaders in Central and Eastern Europe to restructure agriculture.
He writes and speaks on Ethics, Genetics and Agriculture examining their
influence on the future development of society in Developing Countries and in
the West.
Sir John Polkinghorne KBE FRS
Sir John Polkinghorne is an Anglican priest, the former
President of Queens' College, Cambridge University, and former Professor of
Mathematical Physics at Cambridge University. Dr Polkinghorne resigned his chair
in physics to study for the Anglican priesthood. After completing his
theological studies and serving in parishes, he returned to Cambridge. During
this time, he wrote a series of books on the compatibility of religion and
science. These include Quarks, Chaos and Christianity (1994), and most
recently, Belief in God in an Age of Science (2000) and his Gifford
Lectures, The Faith of a Physicist. Dr Polkinghorne was the recipient of
the 2002 Templeton Prize.
Sir Ghillean Prance FRS VMH
Sir Ghillean Prance was for eleven years Director of the
Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, until his retirement in 1999. Prior to this he was
Senior Vice President for Science of the New York Botanical Gardens and Founding
Director of the Garden’s Institute of Economic Botany. He is an expert on the
flora of the Amazon rain forests, having led annual expeditions there over a
period of twenty-five years and described more than 450 Amazonian plants new to
science.
Sir Ghillean was trained as a plant taxonomist and spent over
8 years on fieldwork and botanical exploration in Amazonian Brazil. He has a
world-wide interest in the sustainable development of rainforest ecosystems and
conservation generally; as well as being author of 19 books and editor of a
further 14 books, he has published over 400 papers of both scientific and
general interest on plant systematics, plant ecology, ethnobotany and
conservation.
Mr Matthias Stiefel
Mr Stiefel works in Geneva as Executive Director of WSP
International, a private organisation affiliated with the UN, which uses
action-research and consensus building methodology to assist local and national
actors in war-torn societies in consolidating peace and rebuilding their
countries. It also assists the UN and the international community in better
supporting them in this task. In the early 1970s he was a freelance journalist
and consultant in Southeast Asia. In 1986 he resigned from employment with the
UN to spend five years as a farmer on a traditional dry-land subsistence farm in
the Algarve, motivated by the desire to gain practical field experience of
development issues. Mr Stiefel is also an International Trustee (Chair) of A
Rocha International.
Mr David Taylor
Mr David Taylor is Director of the USAID Office of Transition
Initiatives. Prior to USAID, Mr. Taylor served in the private non-profit sector
with ADRA International for 24 years and World Vision for 10 years.
In his current role as Director of USAID/OTI, Mr Taylor’s
tasks include that of providing assistance to ordinary citizens in fragile,
failing or recovering states. His office has partnered with thirty countries
over the past ten years, and is currently active in ten countries. In several
instances they have supported conservation projects when environmental issues
were identified as key factors in the fragility of the state.
Dr Tony Whitten
Dr Tony Whitten is Senior Biodiversity Specialist for the
East Asia and Pacific Region at the World Bank in Washington, D.C., where he
attempts to achieve the conservation of forests, wildlife, karst biota, and
freshwater biodiversity by whatever means. He has written over a dozen books on
the ecology and natural history of Indonesia, and works throughout the East Asia
region from Mongolia to New Guinea. Dr Whitten manages stand-alone conservation
projects, research/capacity projects, a regional project on faiths and the
environment, and environmental assessment on other World Bank projects.
