Lester R. Brown: Author, Ecologist and Economist

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PLOWBOY: What kind of organization is Worldwatch?

BROWN: We're a private, non-profit research organization of about 12 people. And, when I say 12 people, I mean that's our total staff for research, writing, editing, typing, fund-raising, outreach, reception ... everything. We're a small group, as groups of this type go, and we don't have any aspirations to become larger. I think we're pretty close to the optimal size.

Books constitute our principal product. Every important issue that we select for research results in a book. Often, we'll publish individual chapters of books in progress ... these are our Worldwatch Papers. So far, we've done three books and 16 papers, and we'll release another dozen Worldwatch Papers this year.

I might add that we're not a research institute that does reports which once they're finished-are put on the shelf somewhere to gather dust. The Worldwatch Papers go out to thousands of key people?politicians, analysts, people in the media?all over the world. Each time we publish a new Paper, we hold an international press lunch which includes representatives from the Associated Press and Tass, The Washington Post and Pravda, the Spanish News Service, the German Press Agency, the BBC, The New York Times, and so on. We make a vigorous effort to share the results of our research with anyone who's interested.

PLOWBOY: I understand you've just finished a new Worldwatch Institute book entitled The Twenty-Ninth Day: Accommodating Human Needs and Numbers to the Earth's Resources.

BROWN: That's correct. The book is being published by W.W. Norton and Company of New York. It's due to come out in March 1978.

PLOWBOY: I wonder if you could explain the significance of the book's title. What's the meaning of "the twenty-ninth day"?

BROWN: The title comes from a riddle the French use to teach their schoolchildren exponential growth. The riddle begins with a lily pond that has one leaf in it the first day, two leaves the second day, four the third day, then eight, and so on. Question: If the pond fills on the thirtieth day, when is the pond half full? Answer: the twenty-ninth day.

As I look at the world today?at our global lily pond?I think it's at least half full. Within the next generation, it may fill up entirely. The purpose of the book is to call attention to this fact ... to sound the alarm, so to speak.

PLOWBOY: What conclusions do you arrive at in the book?

BROWN: The principal conclusion of the book is that we're faced with a period of profound change in the years immediately ahead ... change that's so profound-so all-encompassing?that, in many ways, it's difficult to describe.

The changes I foresee derive from two important sources. One is the energy problem we're now facing ... and the other has to do with the stresses being placed on the earth's biological systems.

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