Joseph H. Hulse

Joseph H. Hulse (1923–2013) was a Canadian biochemist, food technologist, writer, and the president of the International Union of Food Science and Technology. He chaired the Committee of the Canadian chapter of the Freedom From Hunger, presided over the Canadian Institute of Food Science and Technology and was the assistant director of nutrition at the Food and Agriculture Organization, besides serving as the vice president of the International Development Research Centre (IDRC). He was the author of several texts and monographs on nutrition and allied sciences, including a 991-page treatise, Sorghum and the Millets: Their Composition and Nutritive Value. The Government of India awarded him the fourth highest civilian honour of the Padma Shri, in 2008, for his contributions to Science and for his humanitarian activities in India.

Biography

Joseph Hulse was born in Great Britain as the son of a baker and started assisting his father from the age of 4. He graduated in Industrial Biochemistry from the University of Manchester in 1943 during which time, he also worked as a farm hand at a local pig and poultry farm. He started his career by joining the Royal Air Force as a Trainee Officer and worked at the Bomber Command till 1947, serving as the in-charge of the educational and vocational training of the air force personnel at the Command. Retiring from the RAF in 1947, he became associated with the British Baking Industries Research Association (BBIRA) and obtained a research fellowship for higher studies in pharmaceutical and food chemistry with which he joined the Royal College of Science and Technology of the Glasgow University, involving in research on baking, specifically on biochemical and biophysical mechanics of bread staling. During this period, he also served as a technical adviser to Scotland and Ireland chapters of BBIRA and his researches at RCST lasted till 1951. He moved to Rome in 1967 to Food and Agriculture Organization as the assistant director where he was associated with the United Nations Development Program (UNDP), with the responsibility for developing nine large food industries. He was also involved in the Codex Alimentarius project, a global standard and set of guidelines related to food safety. He also worked as the Scientific Adviser to the Secretary-General of the United Nations on Food and Nutrition and as the adviser to the United Nations Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC). He stayed in Rome for two years but was invited back to Canada by Maurice Strong, the then president of the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA), as the scientific adviser to the organization, where he oversaw agricultural projects including the storage of food and grain. When CGIAR established five new International Agricultural Research Centers, Hulse acted as the executing agent of the program. In 1980, the African inter-governmental consortium of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) utilised his services as the chairman of its mission to set guidelines for food security. After his resignation from IDRC, he served as the member of a World Bank committee for the establishment of the International Centre on Forestry Research and as an adviser, delegated by the Government of Canada, to the West Bank and Gaza Strip for the establishment of an agro-industries institute for assisting the small farmers. He turned his focus to India in the 1990s which hosted many of his activities for the better part of the next two decades. During this period, he was known to have visited India over 60 times for stays of varying duration, and was involved with the Bio-villages Programme of M. S. Swaminathan Research Foundation.

Joseph Hulse, who was associated with the Siemens-Hulse International Development Consultants, as its president, died on October 22, 2013, aged 90, at his residence in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada.

Legacy I personally can think of no Canadian active in the development field who has had more practical impact on the lives of the poor than Dr. Hulse, says David M. Malone, former president of the International Development Research Centre, Canada.

His association with the M. S. Swaminathan Research Foundation brought him to India in the 1990s and he worked among the tribal women of Kerala, Tamil Nadu and Karnataka for introducing new food processing techniques and for training them in the trade. While working at the International Development Research Centre, he wrote a 997-page treatise, Sorghum and the Millets: Their Composition and Nutritive Value, co-authored by Evangeline Laing, Odette Pearson and published in 1980. Polyphenols in Cereals and Legumes (1980) and Science, Agriculture, and Food Security (1995) are two other notable books published by him. Besides, he has also written monographs such as Triticale and Nutritive value of triticale protein (and the proteins of wheat and rye) and several reports including The Canadian Food Industries in National Survival, Nutritional Standards and Methods of Evaluation for Food Legume Breeders, World Food Resources – an Overview and Agriculture International Engine of Economic Advance.

Awards and honours Joseph Hulse, in his capacity as one of the founders of the International Committee of Food Science and Technology (ICFoST), delivered the inaugural Founder's Lecture at the IUFoST World Congress of 1991. He was an Outstanding Alumnus awardee (1998) He was also elected as an Honorary Fellow by the national Institutes of Food Science and Technology of the UK, Australia and New Zealand, all in 1980

The Polish Academy of Sciences awarded him their Distinguished Service Medal in 1983. The Earth Society of India and the Rotary Club International selected him for the Conservation of the Environment Award in 1998 and he was the only non-Indian to receive the award.