Stanford University
Encina Hall, E404
Stanford, CA 94305-6055

wpfalcon@stanford.edu
(650) 723-6367 (voice)
(650650) 725-1992 (fax)

Research Interests
biotechnology; food security; food and agricultural policy in developing countries, particularly Indonesia and Mexico

Walter Falcon is deputy director of the Food Security and the Environment Program, former director of the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies, and Farnsworth professor of International Agricultural Policy at Stanford University (Emeritus).

Specializing on agricultural policy in developing countries, Falcon provides a wide array of research experience as an analyst and consultant in international economic and environmental policy. His current research focuses on agricultural decision-making in Indonesia and Mexico, and on biotechnology, climate change, and biofuels.

In 1972, Falcon moved to Stanford University's Food Research Institute where he served as professor of economics and director until 1991. The previous ten years he held a faculty position at Harvard University. From 1991-1998, he directed the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies, and from 1998-2007 he co-directed the Center for Environmental Science and Policy. He has also served as senior associate dean for the social sciences, a member of the academic senate, and twice a member of the University's Advisory Board.

Falcon has consulted with numerous international organizations, and has been a trustee of Winrock International and chairman of the board of the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI). From 1978 to 1980, he was a member of the Presidential Commission on World Hunger and in 1990 he was named a Fellow of the American Agricultural Economics Association. Falcon became a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 1991. From 1996-2001 he served as chairman of the board of the International Corn and Wheat Institute (CIMMYT), and from 2001-07 served on the board of the Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR).

Falcon was cited as the outstanding 1958 graduate of Iowa State University in 1989 and in 1992 he was awarded the prestigious Bintang Jasa Utama medal of merit by the government of Indonesia for twenty-five years of assistance with that country's development effort.

He has co-authored three volumes on Indonesian agriculture and has given numerous food-policy short courses at the Indonesian Food Ministry. His 1971 essay on the "Green Revolution" was honored by the American Agricultural Economics Association (AAEA), as was his 1983 co-authored volume, Food Policy Analysis. His recent co-authored papers have analyzed the effects of El Nino on Indonesian agriculture; the effects of reforms in Mexican agriculture; and the effects of modern biotechnology on plant genetic resources in developing countries; and the likely impacts of climate change on agriculture. His co-taught course on "The World Food Economy" has been taken by thousands of Stanford students.

Falcon received a BS in Agricultural Economics at Iowa State University in 1958, an MA in Economics at Harvard University in 1960, and a PhD in Economics from Harvard University in 1962.