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About the speaker, Dr. Joseph Hulse:

Canadian biochemist Joseph H. Hulse, a former vice-president of Canada’s International Development Research Centre (IDRC), has received the Padma Shri award, one of India’s highest civilian honours for distinguished service and excellence.

Professor Hulse has enjoyed a long and illustrious career, both in academia and international development. He worked at IDRC from 1970 to 1987 as a program director and later as Vice-President of Research.

He has also served as President of the Canadian Institute of Food Science and Technology, Chair of the Canadian Freedom From Hunger Committee, Assistant Director of Nutrition at the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization, and President of the International Union of Food Science and Technology.

He is currently Visiting Professor at the University of Manchester, the Central Food Technological Research Institute in Mysore, India, and the M.S. Swaminathan Research Foundation in Tamil Nadu, India.
In 2006, he was elected Fellow for Life of India’s National Academy of Sciences.

Hulse is the author of the 2007 book Sustainable Development at Risk: Ignoring the Past, co-published by IDRC and Foundation Books. Long-time IDRC partner M.S. Swaminathan presided over the September 2007 launch of the book in New Delhi, where he remarked on the timeliness of the publication for researchers and others seeking to promote sustainable, pro-poor development.

Professor Hulse is among seven foreigners on this year’s Padma awards list, which also contains a posthumous honour for New Zealand’s Everest hero, Sir Edmund Hillary. Former IDRC Chair and Canadian Secretary of State for External Affairs Flora MacDonald received the Padma Shri award in 2004.

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Synopsis of the Talk on "Alleviation of rural child malnutrition in South India"

The talk will discuss the speaker’s activities in agriculture, food production, preservation, processing and utilisation among Indian rural communities.

Diverse activities in India began during the early 1960s when the Canadian Freedom From Hunger Programme, of which the speaker was chairman, raised $350,000 to establish an International Food Technology Training Centre [IFTTC] in a palace provided by the Maharaja of Mysore. The training centre served all Asian nations and was intended to reduce immense loss of perishable foods evident throughout Asia. Asian men and women were trained in effective, economic methods of food preservation. The first course started in 1964. The first trainees who completed a 2-year course graduated in 1967. Subsequently the IFTTC became a campus of the United Nation’s University and has trained over 8000 men and women from close to 50 Asian, African and Middle Eastern nations. During the past 15 years the speaker has been Visiting Professor to IFTTC .

Later activities included cooperation with the Indian Council of Agricultural Research [ICAR] in improving production of oilseeds, root crops, minor millets and rural aquaculture in village ponds. The speaker worked with and provided financial support for the alleviation of malnutrition among rural women and children in Andhra Pradesh. For several years he was scientific adviser to Dr Atma Ram, D-G of the Indian CSIR.

During the past 15 years the speaker has worked with several Indian NGOs, government agencies, food and agricultural industries in a cooperative programme to alleviate infant malnutrition, to increase food production and employment among rural communities in Karnataka, Kerala, Tamil Nadu and Pondicherry.

The speaker has learned abundantly from many close friendships with Indian scientists and rural people.

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