Chandler, Robert F.

Chandler, Robert F. (1907–  ) agronomist; born in Columbus, Ohio. He was state horticulturalist to the Maine Department of Agriculture (1929–31) until returning to his alma mater, the University of Maine, for his doctorate (1934). He taught at Cornell University (1935–47) and then the University of New Hampshire (1947–54) where he also directed the Agricultural Experiment Station and headed the College of Agriculture. He was appointed president of the University of New Hampshire in 1950. At the Rockefeller Foundation (1954–75) he established the International Rice Research Institute in the Philippines; there (1959–72) he developed varieties of tropical rice that more than doubled traditional yields and averted a famine predicted for Asia in the 1970s. In Taiwan (1972–75) he was the Foundation's first director of the Asian Vegetable Research and Development Center. Back in the United States, he wrote a history of the Rice Institute, and served as an international consultant on rural agricultural development.