The green revolution started in India in the late 1960s. The Ford Foundation helped us to make Green Revolution successful. Both Ford Foundation and Rockefeller Foundation were heavily involved in the initial development of the Green Revolution in Mexico. Despite bureaucratic hurdles imposed by India’s grain monopolies, the Ford Foundation and the Indian government collaborated to import wheat seeds from International Maize and Wheat Improvements Center.
The Ford Foundation is an American private Foundation or NGO. It was created in 1936 by Edsel Ford and his father Henry Ford. Here a question is raised, why did the Ford Foundation help India in her Green Revolution initiative?
The answer to the above question can be as follows. The first explanation is that the Ford Foundation was set up for advancing human welfare. The second reason lies in the International politics of that time. That was the period of the intense cold war. The world was divided into two camps, one led by the USA and the second led by USSR. Though India was one of the founding members of Non- The alignment Movement ie NAM, India was showing more inclination towards USSR by then.
One of the main reasons for India’s inclination towards the USSR was the war weapons which we were getting from the USSR. The USA was not interested to provide war weapons to India. But, at the same time, the USA wanted to give something to India so that India could not be completely inclined towards USSR. So, the USA directed the Ford Foundation to help India in her initiative of Green Revolution. Thus, the USA had not provided war weapons to India but provided the Green Revolution technology through the Ford Foundation.
To conclude, Ford Foundation helped us by providing agriculture technology which averted the future famines of India.
