Water Resources People and Issues
A: I took part in planning the studies that the National Water Commission
commissioned, and reviewing some of the materials that were turned out. I
didn't do anything beyond that. That is, I didn't draft any single part of the
set of reports. I only helped plan the studies and made suggestions about who
might participate in producing the documents. Howard Cook was the sort of
number two man to Ted Schad in that.
Incidentally, that group is, I think, unique. They still have an annual
meeting. The members of the commission and the senior staff under Chuck
Lute and Ted Schad get together once a year and talk things over. I think
that the latest one, this year, was down in Arizona. There's a great sense of
camaraderie and common mission.
Q: Professor White, you've also been very much involved in various United
Nations enterprises. I wonder if you could explain some of the projects
you've been involved with on behalf of the United Nations, such as taking
part in the United Nations Scientific Conference on the Conservation and
Utilization of Resources at Lake Success in 1949.
A: Most of them have grown out of my interest in the United States. I expect
the first international program in which I became involved grew out of my
experience with the drought studies and led to my being drawn into the first
international scientific research program that UNESCO established on arid
zone research. That was back in the early fifties. I helped them organize
cooperative research activities dealing with better use of arid lands. This
included the first International Conference on Arid Land Research, which was
held in the Southwest under AAAS [American Academy of Arts and Science]
auspices in 1955, and the 30th anniversary, which is to be celebrated by
another conference in Tucson in October `85.
The United Nations was very much interested in promoting integrated river
development in various developing countries around the world. I was asked
to serve as chair of a panel of people from a number of countries (Colombia,
France, the Netherlands, the USSR, the UK) that brought out a report on
river basin development that's been used often and revised in 1970 by the
United Nations.
That was in the late fifties. Out of this came interest in the environmental
effects of big river projects. I served for a while under the leadership of
Ralph Townley as the consultant to the United Nations Development Program
70
Previous Page
