C. Fred Bentley, OC, PhD, DSc, P. Ag.
A Canadian, C. Fred Bentley was a graduate of the University of Alberta and the University of Minnesota. He enjoyed a distinguished career of teaching and research in soil science. He was among the first generation of Canadian scientists to offer their scientific knowledge and skills to the developing regions of the world. Dr. Bentley undertook assignments in Sri Lanka, Thailand, China, India, and more than a dozen African countries. He was an advisor to the External Aid Office (later to become the Canadian International Development Agency) and was a member of the founding Board of the
IDRC.
Recognitions of his contributions to scientific citizenship included Chair of the Board of Trustees of the International Board of Soil Research and Management and Chairman of the Board of Governors of the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-arid Tropics. His many honours include receipt of the Order of Canada and induction into the Alberta Order of Excellence.
Dr. Bentley believed the systematic inclusion of planted forage or other leguminous crops in cropping sequences on cultivated lands can be increased by conducting simple, well designed, experiments on lands of farmers who, in cooperation with researchers, execute the cropping work themselves, thereby determining the practicality of the cropping systems being evaluated.
Dr. Bentley passed away April 12, 2008.
The Fellowship
A bequest from Helen S. Bentley and C. Fred Bentley provided the initial capital for this Fellowship program. During his travels in developing countries, Dr. Bentley became convinced that ordinary farmers should greatly increase their use of forage crops or grain legumes in the cropping systems on their cultivated lands. In most cases the major benefits would be: increased profitable grain yields; production of more and better livestock feed; and improved soil conservation by reduction of soil erosion and/or the benefits of biological fixation of nitrogen by leguminous crops.
Members of the public who wish to support the Bentleys’ vision may send contributions to the Fellowship program at the address above; such donations will be tax deductible. As its contribution,
IDRC provides the administration of the Fellowship at no cost to the program.
IDRC will also add to the program fund when necessary.
Great flexibility for location of the individual on-farm experiments is desirable and their location is important to consider.
Dr. Bentley was of the opinion that there would be enormous advantages if a school or schools would get involved in some on-farm experiments.
The students could learn things that would be useful in the years ahead;
The whole community would hear about what is going on, and learn by seeing the experiment(s) or by hearing about them;
In any case, an experiment should never be called a demonstration because that implies something good will result; if the demonstration fails, the researchers lose credibility in the community;
The nature of an experiment needs careful explanation: ‘we are going to try something that we hope might make a difference or find a way to increase crop yields;
Student and parent interest would be increased greatly if the students actually participated by: helping to measure and lay out the experiment; weeding as the crops grow; assisting in sample collection by holding the bags; helping to carry samples for weighing; weighing samples, etc;
Perhaps students would enjoy competition: girls against boys; Grade X against Y; a competition between two nearby schools. Small prizes could be offered to those who do the best job of the task at hand;
Another possibility would be to have students assist in experiments on two near-by farms with distinctly different kinds of soil.
After the plots have been cultivated and are ready for seeding, there is a need for a push-type mechanical seeder that can be adjusted for the size of seeds to be used and for the depth at which the seeds are to be placed. There are seeders for gardeners that have those capabilities and they are of a size that makes it easy to transport them.
There are other potential benefits from use of such a seeder:
It makes weeding (when it is needed) much easier to do; and
Some groups of local farmers might adopt use of such a seeder, possibly leading to an important advance in farm practice.
Dr. Bentley did not impose his ideas on Fellowship holders – he sought to assist them to do effective on-farm experiments. He learned from experience in many developing countries that once improved practices are found they are usually adopted rather quickly by farmers – to the benefit of their families and communities.