Telling Our Story

In the previous blog entry I talked about the lead-up to our presentations and here I’ll describe how things went. First, however, I need to call attention to the death of Norman Borlaug, the father of the Green Revolution and the namesake of the institute at Texas A&M that we’ve been working for in Iraq since last June. Even at 95, he was alert and engaged; he was aware and supportive of our team’s work in Iraq. Last night we had a little ceremony to present some certificates and other mementos, including a replica of the 1970 Nobel Peace Prize medal, that was given to the Deputy Leader of the PRT. Our team leader spoke of Norman and mentioned that he was still alive. Little did we know that he was only hours from passing away. At the ceremony last night we were given US flags that were flown over the PRT a few days ago, on 9/11, a special gift and remembrance of our time here.

OK, rewinding to this past Tuesday, the day of our meeting with the governor. Unfortunately the governor had double-booked our meeting time so we were made to wait. Finally we were escorted through a room into another room and through yet another room before reaching the governor’s office, a true inner sanctum. We recognized a few government agricultural officials and were disappointed, but not unexpectedly so, that more people who we wanted to hear what we had to say weren’t present. After a too-long and rambling “introduction” by the governor, our team leader Mark began our presentation. We had discussed strategy going in and decided to lay out the key message—about collaboration and capacity building—right up front, and then go into detail to build the case. While this is going on, the governor is sitting at his desk, signing papers and passing notes to his minions, clearly giving us only half of his attention at most. At one point he handed our BBA a note saying that we needed to wrap things up. We were less than half-way through! We had not choice but to end. In any case, we gave the governor an Arabic translation of our full presentation, so he had the details in hand. We were also able to secure a commitment from him to follow up on the distribution of some tractors that had been given to a farmer’s association in Um Qasr, but were being held by the municipal authorities. So, it wasn’t a total loss. We were able to get our main points across and realized in hindsight that we should have just focused on the big picture and left the details for others. When we returned to base, we decided to modify the presentation for the next meeting, our agriculture “summit.”

The summit took place two days later, on Thursday, at the airport adjacent to the base. We had about 60 farmers, agricultural association leaders, government agricultural officials, extension agents, university professors, and agri-businessmen, most of the people we’ve met over the last couple of months. The meeting was a big success and our presentation was well-received. It was obvious that this was the first time that all the “players” in agriculture in the province had ever gathered in one room. Perhaps this meeting served as an ice-breaker to raise the comfort level of the participants so that they can deal with each other and engage in meaningful dialogue. We sensed some trepidation on the part of the government officials, fearing that they would be verbally attacked by the farmers. When one sheik, quite a curmudgeon, started ranting about how useless the Ministry of Agriculture is to farmers, the other farmers in the room grumbled, recognizing that it was important to look forward to move ahead. The DG of Agriculture, much to our surprise, stood up and addressed the group forthrightly and a good discussion ensued. The group got the message that any projects funded by the PRT will be for demonstration of best practices and will require groups to work together. We received several phone calls later that day thanking us for organizing the meeting and for the work we’ve done on behalf of the farmers of Basrah. It was very gratifying.

Our final briefing took place yesterday, Saturday, on base to the command and the PRT. We met in a conference room at Division headquarters, outfitted with plush seats and video screens facing every possible direction. The meeting was attended by the commanding general of the division, Brigadier General Lang, who had flown with us in his helicopters when we did our aerial tour of the province. We had good rapport with him during and after that flight and this carried over into our presentation. We also had a full-bird colonel, a handful of lieutenant colonels, some majors, a few NCOs, and various other civilians, some representing the division (all of southern Iraq), others representing the battalion now stationed here, responsible for the province. We were given two hours and we used nearly all of it to lay out, in the first part, the big picture which applies to the larger context of all agriculture in Iraq and, in the second part, the details of our assessment and project recommendations for Basrah in particular. The general interrupted numerous times to ask questions, which were pointed and on the mark. It was a good presentation and the general spoke sincerely of his appreciation of our team’s efforts since June of last year. We were gratified and relieved, but also felt tired from the effort we’ve put in over these last eight weeks.

Today we’ve been tying up loose ends and beginning the process of leave taking. Tomorrow we fly to Jordan. I’m going to take a couple of days of sightseeing before heading back home on Thursday. Once I get back, I’ll write a final entry with some reflections on the overall mission and what it’s meant to me and the people I’ve met along the way of this most fascinating and once-in-a-lifetime journey.