Conservation, the federal government, and the international biological program.

The growing concern of biologists that all was not well with their species led to the proposal of an international biological program on the theme "The Biological Basis of Productivity and Human Welfare." At the suggestion of American members of the International Union of Biological Sciences (IUBS), the International Council of Scientific Unions (ICSU) appointed a planning committee. Its report, entitled "International Biological Programme," dated November 15, 1963, was approved that month by the IUBS and by the ICSU at its Tenth General Assembly. The proposed International Biological Program (IBP) had the objectives of ensuring worldwide study of: "(1) organic production on the land, in fresh waters, and in the seas, so that adequate estimates may be made of the potential yield of new as well as existing natural resources, and (2) human adaptability to the changing conditions." From the beginning there has been a sense of urgency because of the rapid rate of increase in the numbers and needs of the human populations of the world and their demands on the natural environment, because of the rapid rate of the changes taking place in all environments throughout the world, and because of the benefit from international collaboration. In anticipation of the report of ICSU's planning committee, the National Academy of Sciences had formed an ad hoc committee which held its first meeting in December 1963, and issued its report in June 1964. This committee made contact with several hundred American biologists having a potential interest in an international program of the type proposed. At this early stage the committee encountered some serious criticisms and general reservations; yet there appeared to be sufficient interest in the potentialities of the -proposed program that it was recommended to the Academy that it send an American delegation to a planning meeting of ICSU in Paris; that it form a U.S. National Committee for the IBP; and that it organize it in a series of subcommittees according to areas of interest in the program. These recommendations were accepted. Nine subcommittees were established, as follows: