Cary Fowler
As the former executive director and current senior advisor of the Global Crop Diversity Trust in Norway, Fowler seeks to ensure the conservation and availability of crop diversity for food security worldwide. He has played a key role in the creation of the Svalbard Global Seed Vault near the Arctic Circle, heading the international committee and developing every aspect of its scientific and operational plan. The vault is designed to store 4.5 million seed samples for centuries. Fowler’s career spans 40 years in international environment and biodiversity studies. In the 1990s, he helped produce the UN’s first-ever global assessment of the world’s plant genetic resources and served as special assistant to the Secretary General of the World Food Summit. The 2013 documentary, Seeds of Time, follows his biodiversity efforts and was an official selection at South by Southwest 2014. He returned to Memphis in 2016, where he now serves as chairman of the board of Rhodes College. This year, Fowler received the 2018 Thomas Jefferson Foundation Medal in Citizen Leadership.
