An adventure in applied science - IRRI books - International Rice ...

Developing and staffing the program 65the Prince spend 9 months at IRRI as a visiting scientist to assist in starting theequipment development program. During his stay, Debriddhi spent much ofhis time improving the design of a cone thresher. Johnson, although alsoworking on that project, concentrated on testing available equipment forwetland preparation and studying losses of irrigation water by evapotranspirationand percolation. He also investigated the relationships between spacingand yield components.In 1967, Johnson went to Louisiana State University on study leave, andthen in 1968 joined CIAT in Colombia to assist that recently established centerin developing and equipping its experimental farm. Johnson is a thorough,conscientious engineer with sound ideas. His contributions to the early developmentof IRRI’s program were truly substantial.Johnson’s work with methods of land preparation and with simple harvestingequipment attracted the interest of visitors from USAID, and in 1965 thatagency made IRRI a grant of $360,000 over a 3-year period for a research projectentitled Farm and Equipment Requirements for the Production of Rice and AssociatedFood Crops in the Far East and in South Asia. The project was started in 1966 withthe arrival of Stanley S. Johnson, a USDA agricultural economist stationed atthe University of California, Davis, who got a 3-year leave of absence toundertake surveys of rice farm operations in the Philippines.In 1967, Amir U. Khan, originally from India, who had recently obtained hisPh D degree at Michigan State University, joined IRRI, succeeding Johnson ashead of the Agricultural Engineering Department. Khan had an unusuallyinventive mind and during the next decade created many original machinerydesigns, some of which are being manufactured in considerable quantity inSouth and Southeast Asia. A. Colin McClung, then associate director of IRRI,deserves the credit for discovering Khan. In 1966, McClung visited the Universityof California to talk with William Chancellor about his interest in going toIRRI. Chancellor, feeling that he could not leave his post in California permanently,recommended Khan for the job and suggested that McClung visit Khanwhile he was in the U.S. McClung was much impressed with Khan’s background,notably with his imagination and innovativeness. It took a bit ofpersuasion to get Khan, a naturalized American citizen, to leave the U.S. andgo to IRRI. He felt that it was important that he be hired by an organization withheadquarters in the United States. The Ford Foundation came to the rescue bygiving him a 5-year contract, which was later renewed. Khan arrived in 1967and is still on IRRI’s staff, although since 1976 he has been stationed in Pakistanwhere IRRI operates an agricultural machinery project in cooperation with theGovernment of Pakistan. Without question, two of the most creative agriculturalengineers working on equipment design in Asia during the past twodecades are Debriddhi Devakul of Thailand and Amir Khan of IRRI.Since 1974-75, IRRI has had a succession of visiting scientists as well asseveral more permanent staff additions in the Agricultural Engineering Department.Although the many people coming and going in that program arenot listed here, some of the achievements of IRRI’s current program inagricultural engineering are presented briefly in Chapter 7.