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The Shadow of Asian Technologies on the Making of the West African Rice Development Association
Mon, July 13, 9:15 to 10:45am, Edinburgh International Conference Centre, Floor: Level 2, Lammermuir 2English Abstract
My paper seeks to decenter Afro-Asian technological exchanges from the high politics of the Bandung Conference by tracing Vu Van Thai’s career across Vietnam, the United Nations, and West Africa. Born in 1919 in colonial Hanoi, Vu trained at the École des Arts et Manufactures in Paris and briefly served as an advisor to Ho Chi Minh. After returning to Vietnam in the 1950s, he became director general of planning in 1955 and subsequently alternated between ambassadorial posts for South Vietnam and United Nations advisory roles in development programs. He was a regular participant in the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Far East during the 1950s and served on the committee that organized the Colombo Plan Conference in 1957.
Likely due to his extensive developmental experience in Southeast Asia, Vu led a United Nations fact-finding mission on West African rice production in March 1968. In that mission and the ensuing discussions with potential donors, he highlighted the challenges of transplanting Asian technologies to Africa and emphasized the need for West African institutions to conduct research and tailor technologies to local rice ecologies. His arguments helped shape the creation of the first regional rice association, the West Africa Rice Development Association, in the early 1970s, later integrated into the World Bank–hosted Consultative Group for International Agricultural Research (CGIAR). By examining Vu’s views on the appropriate relationship between Asian and African technologies, this paper explores how Asian expertise was assessed within the United Nations and how a specialist in Southeast Asian development came to advocate for an organization dedicated to African technologies.