Council of Reference – Plateau Perspectives

Dr Calvin DeWitt's Bio

Calvin DeWitt is Professor of Environmental Studies, the Nelson Institute, University of Wisconsin-Madison, and President Emeritus of Au Sable Institute. He is a physiological ecologist and ecosystems ecologist with a focus on wetland ecosystems. At Au Sable Institute he developed a program beginning in 1979 that now serves more than 60 Christian colleges and universities in North America, India, and Africa with courses in Christian environmental stewardship.
In the area of interface between ecology and Judeo-Christian environmental ethics he is co-author (with Sir Ghillean Prance) of Missionary Earthkeeping (1992) and author of Caring for Creation: Responsible Stewardship of God’s Handiwork (1997).

Sir Brian Heap CBE ScD FRS's Bio

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Sir Brian Heap is Research Associate at the Centre for Development Studies, Cambridge, former Master of St Edmund’s College, Cambridge University, and a Fellow and former Foreign Secretary of The Royal Society. He is an eminent animal biologist and was Director of the Babraham Institute, Cambridge and the Roslin Institute, Edinburgh, and Director of Science, UK Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council. He was the UK representative on the NATO Science Committee, President of the European Academies Science Advisory Council, and has worked with the World Health Organization in China. Professor Heap holds doctorates from Cambridge and Nottingham, has published extensively, holds distinguished awards for his scientific and international work, and currently works on energy for off-grid villages and the bottom billion.

Dr John Hodges's Bio

Dr John Hodges is an animal geneticist experienced in development agriculture, biodiversity, agro-resources, the food chain and commerce. Today he writes and speaks on ethics and justice in the use of science and business for the poor and to feed the growing global population. During his career he was responsible for animal breeding and genetic resources in the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations in Rome where he had wide experience of small-scale agriculture in the development world. Previously he was Professor of Animal Genetics at the University of British Columbia, Canada, and earlier taught at Cambridge University, UK. Formerly he was Head of the Production Division of the Milk Marketing Board of England and Wales. After the end of the USSR he worked for the European Union to assist governments in Eastern Europe to restructure agriculture from central planning to market economy and from state to private ownership of land. He has degrees in agriculture, livestock production and genetics from Reading and Cambridge Universities (UK) and in business administration from Harvard University (USA). He is deeply concerned with empowerment of poor farmers to produce more food, the creation and equitable sharing of wealth, and improving the quality of life at all levels, physical, mental, emotional and spiritual.

Sir Ghillean Prance FRS VMH's Bio

Sir Ghillean Prance was for eleven years Director of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, until his retirement in 1999. Prior to this he was Senior Vice President for Science of the New York Botanical Gardens and Founding Director of the Garden’s Institute of Economic Botany. He is an expert on the flora of the Amazon rain forests, having led annual expeditions there over a period of twenty-five years and described more than 450 Amazonian plants new to science.

Sir Ghillean was trained as a plant taxonomist and spent over 8 years on fieldwork and botanical exploration in Amazonian Brazil. He has a world-wide interest in the sustainable development of rainforest ecosystems and conservation generally; as well as being author of 19 books and editor of a further 14 books, he has published over 400 papers of both scientific and general interest on plant systematics, plant ecology, ethnobotany and conservation. He is presently also Chair of A Rocha International.

Dr John Sale's Bio

Dr John Sale is a consultant on biodiversity conservation in Africa and Asia, both as an academic and as advisor to several non-profit organisations including Plateau Perspectives. He has served as UN Chief Technical Adviser to national governments on post-graduate training and research on wildlife. He also is the author of numerous papers on mammal biology and technical aspects of the conservation of tropical species and their habitats, ranging from elephants and rhinos to orangutans. Dr Sale also is one of the founders of the John Ray Initiative and presently serves as its International Secretary.

Mr Matthias Stiefel's Bio

Mr Stiefel works in Geneva as Executive Director of WSP International, a private organisation affiliated with the UN, which uses action-research and consensus building methodology to assist local and national actors in war-torn societies in consolidating peace and rebuilding their countries. It also assists the UN and the international community in better supporting them in this task. In the early 1970s he was a freelance journalist and consultant in Southeast Asia. In 1986 he resigned from employment with the UN to spend five years as a farmer on a traditional dry-land subsistence farm in the Algarve, motivated by the desire to gain practical field experience of development issues. Mr Stiefel is also an International Trustee of A Rocha International.

Mr David Taylor's Bio

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Mr David Taylor is a retired executive with 46 years experience in humanitarian and international development work. He was Executive Advisor in Humanitarian Assistance for World Vision International from 2005 to 2013. Prior to this, he was Director of USAID’s Office of Transition Initiatives. Mr. Taylor also served in the private non-profit sector with ADRA International for 24 years. In each of these roles, he has provided strategic advice and leadership to improve international humanitarian response. World Vision is a Christian relief, development and advocacy organisation dedicated to working with children, families and communities to overcome poverty and injustice.

Dr Norman Wirzba's Bio

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Dr Norman Wirzba grew up farming in Western Canada, and now teaches in theology, philosophy, ecology, and sustainable/regenerative agriculture at Duke Divinity School and Duke’s Nicholas School for the Environment. In particular, he writes and speaks on matters that will enable people to live more faithfully and beautifully in the world. His current work focuses on helping Christians recover the deep insights of the doctrine of creation. He is the author and editor of several books, including The Paradise of God: Renewing Religion in an Ecological Age, Food and Faith: A Theology of Eating, Making Peace with the Land: God’s Call to Reconcile with Creation (with Fred Bahnson), and The Essential Agrarian Reader: The Future of Culture, Community, and the Land.

Norman’s two newest books are From Nature to Creation: A Christian Vision for Understanding and Loving our World (Baker Academic) and Way of Love: Recovering the Heart of Christianity (HarperOne).