An Afternoon with Dr. Geoffrey Hawtin

Join WorldDenver along with the Colorado State University College of Agricultural Sciences, the Denver Botanic Gardens, and Crop Trust, in welcoming Dr. Geoffrey Hawtin, World Food Prize Laureate for 2024, to Colorado for a lecture and conversation at the Denver Botanic Gardens.

As former Executive Directors of the Crop Trust, Dr. Hawtin and Dr. Cary Fowler were recognized in 2024 for their extraordinary leadership in preserving and protecting the world’s heritage of crop diversity and mobilizing this critical resource to defend against threats to global food security. Under Hawtin and Fowler’s leadership, and in partnership with the Government of Norway, the Svalbard Global Seed Vault was established in 2008 and serves as the backup facility for the world’s crop diversity.

Free and Open to All — Space is Limited.

About the Speaker:

 

Dr. Geoffrey Hawtin is an agricultural scientist and research leader with special expertise and

experience in agrobiodiversity. He has headed two CGIAR Centres: Bioversity International

(then the International Plant Genetic Resources Institute, or IPGRI) in Rome from 1991 to 2003

and the Centro Internacional de Agricultura Tropical (CIAT) in Colombia from 2008 to 2009.

While at IPGRI, he was instrumental in establishing the Crop Trust and served as its first CEO

from 2003 to 2005. In his career, he also served as Director of the Agriculture, Food and

Nutrition Sciences Division of the International Development Research Center (IDRC) in Canada

and was Deputy Director General of the International Centre for Agricultural Research in the

Dry Areas (ICARDA) in Syria. In 2017, Dr. Hawtin was recognized by the United Kingdom’s

Queen Elizabeth II for “services to global agrobiodiversity conservation, subsistence livelihood

enhancement and sustainable food programmes”. In 2024, he and Dr. Cary Fowler, also a

former Executive Director of the Crop Trust, were awarded the World Food Prize “for their

extraordinary leadership in preserving and protecting the world’s heritage of crop biodiversity

and mobilizing this critical resource to defend against threats to global food security.”

 

Dr. Hawtin is currently a member of the Executive Board of the Crop Trust, the world’s only

international organization solely focused on securing crop diversity in genebanks, so that

researchers, breeders, and farmers can access and use it in perpetuity. The Crop Trust works to

strengthen the global network of genebanks, which together safeguard over 5.9 million samples of seeds. This crop diversity underpins the development of new crop varieties that are resilient

to emerging challenges such as extreme heat, drought, pests and diseases. This work by Dr.

Hawtin, the Crop Trust and the global genebank community aims to ensure humanity’s food

supplies remains secure long into the future.