Bill Gates Calls for More Accountability on Food Programs [View all]

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Whatever you think of Microsoft, Bill Gates is a philanthropist who puts his money where his mouth is.

"The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has brought a distinctive approach to problems of global development: a sense of urgency, a willingness to make big investments in pursuit of ambitious targets, and — above all — a hard-nosed insistence on results that can be counted and documented. The Gateses, who are heavily involved in managing the foundation that bears their name, take the view that setting explicit numerical targets and holding people to them is one key to progress.

Now Mr. Gates is calling for a stringent application of that approach in the field of global agriculture. In a speech Thursday morning in Rome, he called on the United Nations agencies that deal with world food supply to set a global target for the productivity growth of agriculture.

He did not specify what the target should be, presumably leaving room for experts to weigh in on what is achievable — and for horse-trading among the affected agencies. But he outlined a strategy that would include scorecards of progress against which agencies (and possibly whole countries) could be measured, creating a sort of race to improve. And he wants this plan in place by the end of the year."

http://green.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/02/23/bill-gates-calls-for-more-accountability-on-food-programs/