We began working with the Howard G. Buffett Foundation (HGBF) in November, 2010 with our Foundation’s Farmers Feeding the World (FFW) initiative and separately with HGBF and Farm Journal Media on a couple of sustainable agricultural production information programs.
In that first planning and strategy meeting at HGBF, Howard mentioned that he was looking to hire a film crew to accompany him to Afghanistan to film some of the initiatives he had started with both the United Nations World Food Programme (anti-hunger relief and development) and the Norman Borlaug Institute (agricultural development and anti-hunger development.
When I volunteered that the Farm Journal TV crew that shot the “More Than A Promise” video for FFW was probably available, Howard jumped at the chance, especially if Kip Tom, our farmer representative on the Foundation and key to the video, would accompany the film crew. Kip readily agreed, and I was invited to tag along.
The original trip was just to Afghanistan. Because of some security issues in the mountainous region of the Afghan—Pakistan border near Jalalabad, we had to eliminate that part of the trip, which was unfortunate because HGBF was funding the completion of the new building for the agricultural college at Nangarhar University which was overseen by the Borlaug people. I guess Howard felt guilty when I asked if we could return early or see some ag development elsewhere, so he and his son Howard W replaced Nangarhar with a two day trip to Kurdistan, the Northern region of Iraq. This provided an incredible before and after comparison—N. Iraq vs Afghanistan-- as to what can be accomplished with grassroots agricultural development efforts. It also provided a good look at what a true, grassroots and entrepreneurial development effort can accomplish in working with the people on their “home court”.
At this time I should mention the U.S. Department of Defense “Task Force for Business and Stability Operations (TFBSO)"—which was the heart of the positives we witnessed in both Afghanistan and Iraq—and which is now being neutered and folded into the USAid program and is a short-sighted travesty.
The Department of Defense, and in particular TFBSO, was the sponsor of our mission, as well as, in essence, co-funded the logistics of the mission with HGBF. Howard W. Buffett, the son of Howard G., is a very bright, energetic, matter-of-fact and effective 27 year old director of agricultural development for TFBSO. He reports to a juggernaut Silicon Valley executive turned War-Zone Economic Turnaround Artist named Paul Brinkley who left his important CA job to rebuild Iraq and Afghanistan as Undersecretary of Defense in charge of the TFBSO.
Howard W and Brinkley made sure that we witnessed situations and developmental activity in especially Afghanistan that few other American politicians and business executives etc would ever venture out to see. It’s a story that is not told at all in the American media, because it’s not headline-worthy enough—but it completely turned around Kip’s and my (and TV producers) impressions of Afghanistan and what’s needed by 180?.
