Abstract
The need for participatory approaches has been mentioned several times. For the skeptics about the role of participation in research, let me say that participation is not a substitute for science. It enhances the practice of science, because it elaborates on its human purpose. About research partnerships, please look beyond the national agricultural research institutes. We have excellent researchers, many of whom are not in the national agricultural research institutes. But please treat national researchers as partners. We must do more adoption and impact-assessment studies so that our evaluation culture will grow, and press releases do not substitute for impact. Please do all you can to keep research output in the public domain so that the poor can afford them.
Nutritional status should be the bottom-line indicator of human development. In presenting statistics on micronutrient deficiencies, we need to give these numbers a human face—most likely a female face. I have always believed that research must have a human purpose, and when the best of science and scientists are devoted to the problems of those who have less in life, that is ethics and equity at its best. Nutritional status is about as human as we can get.