In the 1940s Borlaug bred semi-dwarf wheat in Mexico that resisted disease and yielded far more grain. Higher yields raised farmers’ incomes and let nations rely less on imported food. When the techniques reached India and Pakistan, wheat output per hectare almost doubled within a few years, sharply reducing the threat of famine. This achievement is called the “Green Revolution” and is praised for strengthening peace by stabilizing food supplies. However, increased use of fertilizer, pesticides, and water also raised environmental concerns, so balancing productivity with sustainability remains an important issue.

Working at Mexico’s National Agricultural Research Institute, Borlaug combined dwarfing genes rht1/rht2 from Japanese wheat with diverse rust-resistant germplasm to create high-yield, lodging-resistant lines that responded strongly to fertilizer. This package, coupled with expanded irrigation, dramatically raised wheat self-sufficiency in India and Pakistan. His introduction of “shuttle breeding,” growing two generations per year in contrasting altitude and climate zones, halved the breeding cycle and was revolutionary. The approach laid the groundwork for the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR) and later breakthroughs in rice and maize. While nitrogen runoff, pesticide dependence, and genetic uniformity now raise concerns, the Green Revolution remains a landmark demonstration of how agricultural innovation can underpin peace and development.

Borlaug pyramided vertical resistance genes such as Sr2 and Sr7b against Puccinia graminis f. sp. tritici while introgressing GA-responsive dwarfing alleles from Norin lines to minimize canopy lodging. At CIMMYT he optimized shuttle breeding, alternating selection cycles between contrasting photoperiod and altitude environments to rapidly generate lines robust to G×E interactions. Post-release of PB-5 and Kalyan Sona in India, yields exceeded 4 t ha⁻¹ under 150 kg ha⁻¹ NPK, more than doubling local landraces. His protocol shaped the multidisciplinary CGIAR research platform and influenced IR8 rice and CIMMYT maize breeding strategies. Nevertheless, fossil-fuel-intensive fertilizer use, elevated N₂O emissions, and narrowed genetic diversity emerged as externalities, motivating current reevaluation via climate-smart agriculture and genomic selection frameworks.