In this project, journalist Ted Alcorn investigates how America’s withdrawal from agricultural science is unraveling a cornerstone of global food security. For decades, U.S. agencies funded crop-breeding and disease-surveillance programs at universities and international research centers, most recently through the initiative Feed the Future. With the dismantling of USAID, those investments were sharply reduced, including at the Mexico-based International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT), which launched the Green Revolution and coordinates global early-warning systems for crop pathogens.
As other donors also retreated, CIMMYT saw roughly 40 percent of its budget disappear—about $80 million—and its leadership warns it may not survive another year without new funding. Its work underpins much of the world’s wheat production; an estimated 60 percent of U.S. varieties trace back to CIMMYT’s germplasm. China is interested in filling some of the gap, but with conditions that could ultimately limit access to that genetic library.
Reporting from CIMMYT’s headquarters and field sites in Mexico, Alcorn documents how the decline of modest U.S. investments is reshaping global food security and geopolitical influence.
