The 1977 Ramon Magsaysay Award for International Understanding

Sixty-eight years ago, on June 14, 1909, the UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES COLLEGE OF AGRICULTURE was born at Los Baños, Laguna. Under the leadership of Dean Edwin B. Copeland, 12 Filipino students and four American scientist-educators literally hacked out the COLLEGE from semi-wilderness with the tenacity, innovativeness and camaraderie that have come to be known as the "Los Baños spirit." Out of these beginnings, and with the same spirit, successive generations of faculty and students have made of the COLLEGE OF AGRICULTURE and of the larger university that has evolved out of it, the productive academic community that it is today.

The College of Forestry branched out of the COLLEGE OF AGRICULTURE in 1916. In the early sixties the Agricultural Credit and Cooperatives Institute and the Dairy Training and Research Institute were created, later to become separate units of the University. Since 1972 the COLLEGE OF AGRICULTURE has undergone much transformation, largely brought about by the creation by presidential decree of an autonomous University of the Philippines at Los Baños (UPLB) under the University of the Philippines System. In addition to the older units, the UPLB now has a Graduate School, College of Sciences and Humanities, Institute of Human Ecology, Institute of Agricultural Development and Administration, Institute of Agricultural Engineering and Technology, Agrarian Reform Institute, Center for Policy and Development Studies, and a National Training Center for Rural Development. The UPLB also has a National Center for Agriculture and Resources Research.

At present the UPLB COLLEGE OF AGRICULTURE retains nine academic departments: Agronomy, Horticulture, Animal Science; Soil Science, Entomology, Plant Pathology, Food Science and Technology, Agricultural Education, and Development Communication. By two presidential decrees it has added within its organization an Institute of Plant Breeding and a National Crop Protection Center. It also has a Sugar Technology Program, the Central Experiment Station, the UP Rural High School and a Research and Training Station in La Granja, Negros Occidental.

In its 68 years the now UPLB COLLEGE OF AGRICULTURE has tried to do its best, and will continue to try to do so, in carrying out its mission of service to country and people and to the region as a whole. Its strength continues to lie in its faculty, other academic and administrative staff, students and alumni who share a deep sense of commitment to national development. Representing these constituencies through the years is the succession of deans of the COLLEGE after Edwin Copeland: Charles F. Baker, Bienvenido M. Gonzalez, Leopoldo B. Uichanco, Francisco O. Santos, Dioscoro L. Umali, Faustino T. Orillo, Fernando A. Bernardo and your humble servant. As the incumbent, I am greatly privileged to receive this recognition today of the COLLEGE OF AGRICULTURE'S cumulative achievements over the years.

I would be remiss if I did not acknowledge the contribution and support to the COLLEGE of our Chancellor of the University of the Philippines at Los Baños, Dr. Abelardo G. Samonte. Likewise, the COLLEGE would not have earned this recognition without the help and cooperation of its sister units in the UPLB. I convey to all of them our sincere appreciation.

I must also say that the COLLEGE OF AGRICULTURE has had excellent cooperation from, and working relationships with, the Department of Agriculture, its National Food and Agriculture Council and various agencies; a number of foreign governments; philanthropic organizations such as the Rockefeller and Ford Foundations; academic institutions such as Cornell University, the Southeast Asian Regional Center for Graduate Study and Research in Agriculture (SEARCA) and the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI); and many other agencies, institutions and organizations, both public and private, local and international.

It is with distinct pleasure that I accept on behalf of the COLLEGE OF AGRICULTURE, UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINE’s AT LOS BAÑOS, the Ramon Magsaysay Award for International Understanding. My colleagues and I pledge ourselves anew to the service of our fellow beings— especially the many small farmers in the Philippines and in Asia—guided by the spirit of Ramon Magsaysay and his concern for the masses.