Introduction  
A Model of Point IV Private Aid  
Mission 
Structure and Organization  
AIA Brazil and IRI Agricultural Research  
AIA Venezuela  
Inter-American Projects 
Working with USAID in Chile and Brazil (1961-68)  
Private Funds 
Reasons for Terminating AIA  
Conclusion  
 

Introduction 

      AIA is an historical model of U.S. private foreign aid prior to the creation of permanent U.S. government foreign assistance programs in 1961.¹  Between 1946 and 1961, AIA represented what President Harry S. Truman described as "Point IV" aid.  Under this policy, the United States government encouraged the private sector to export U.S. technical expertise in an effort to increase the standard of living in developing countries.  

      AIA exemplifies how aid programs functioned when budgets were smaller and overall objectives were limited.  As a small non-profit organization, it operated educational, agricultural, and healthcare programs on a shoestring budget of $11.75 million dollars allocated over a 22-year period.  These funds were raised from private individuals and corporations that were an integral part of civil society in the countries where the funded projects were based.  For example, oil companies based in Venezuela that contributed to AIA were interested in promoting Venezuelan educational projects and socio-economic development.  

      AIA's initial approach was simple—a man, a girl, and a jeep.  According to AIA's leadership, these three components offered an opportunity to “lower the cost of living, raise the standard of living, preserve freedom and human dignity, and improve life by increasing the production of goods and services in demand on efficient economical basis."²  The man was an agricultural extensionist, the girl was the home economist and the jeep was the only vehicle that could make it through the backcountry roads.  AIA's leadership believed this was all that was needed to make the "most efficient use of private capital, management and technology to raise standard of living and create more opportunity for people."³  

      AIA chose to concentrate on education, healthcare, and agriculture programs in rural areas based on the philosophy that rural development needed to precede industrial development.  This was shaped by the fact that in the 1940s and 1950s, a majority of the population in developing countries still lived in rural areas and large-scale migration to urban centers was in an incipient phase.  

      AIA implemented its plans in Latin America, as this was the region best known to its leadership and staff.  A majority of the board of directors had worked as executives at the Office of Inter-American Affairs during World War II.  This agency was a special U.S. government agency set up to handle social, economic, and political relations with other nations in the Western Hemisphere during the war.⁴  Latin America was the region that the board knew best, and this was where they were going to initiate their new AIA philosophy.  They believed that their efforts came at a crucial point in Latin American development.  If technology and education could rapidly modernize basic infrastructure and services people could attain a higher quality of living.  If not, Latin Americans faced the prospect that an exploding population would exacerbate the already disproportionate gap between the rich and poor.  

      Fundraising for AIA was never easy, even with the direct involvement of the Rockefeller family.  However, it was not until the 1960's that it became virtually impossible due to President John F. Kennedy's decision that socio-economic development should be institutionalized in permanent, large-scale U.S. government aid agencies.  Kennedy "technocrats" at new agencies such as the U.S. Agency for International Development and the Peace Corps proclaimed to have all the answers.  They had an unlimited budget to match their claims.  Under these circumstances, private aid and participation from civil society gradually shrank as it was no longer necessary or appreciated.  AIA was closed in 1968 and a majority of its staff retired from international aid.  
 
A Model Example of Point IV Private Aid 
 

AIA evolved at a time when President Harry S. Truman was crafting a new foreign policy to encourage the private sector to provide economic aid to foreign countries.  W. Averell Harriman, Truman's Secretary of Commerce organized a special executive committee on this issue in 1947.  Harriman, a wealthy railroad heir selected various influential businessmen from the President's Committee on Economic Development to assist him.  Their recommendations resulted in the passage of the Economic Cooperation Act of 1948.  This legislation authorized the U.S. government to fight the spread of Communism with economic aid programs.  Under this new directive, the United States implemented the Marshall Plan in Europe and began an effort to address underdevelopment in Africa, Asia, and Latin America.5

Truman unveiled his new foreign policy to the American people in his 1949 Inaugural Address.  He explained that he planned to rely on four strategies to fight the escalating Cold War.  These included: 1) unfaltering support for the United Nations; 2) programs for world economic recovery including the Marshall Program and tariff reduction; 3) defense pacts such as NATO and the United Nations Charter; and 4) making the benefits of scientific advances and industrial progress available for the improvement and growth of underdeveloped areas. 

      Truman's Point IV policy was derived from the fourth point of this speech.  He acknowledged that hunger, misery, and despair had to be combated in order to keep the developing world from falling under control of Communism.  This fight would be launched by exporting U.S. technical knowledge so that "the free peoples of the world, through their own efforts, produce more food, more clothing, more materials for housing, and more mechanical power to lighten their burdens."  This was to be achieved with the "cooperation of business, private capital, agriculture, and labor in this country."⁶  By the early 1950s, AIA was frequently cited as a model of Point IV policy in action.⁷  
 

AIA's Mission  

       AIA is an acronym for American International Association for Economic and Social Development.  Established in 1946, it aimed to "help people help themselves." AIA's founders were imbued with youthful energy, growing concern about the Cold War, and a desire to see modern American capitalism expand globally.  They grappled with how to find permanent solution for poverty, disease, underdevelopment, and destitution in the Third World.  They concluded that these problems could only be solved by raising the standard of living.  AIA's leaders believed that this would only happen if people were taught to be active participants in harnessing their resources and productivity.  

       AIA's leadership decided that the first projects would be launched in Brazil and Venezuela.  Berent Friele, board member and senior vice president had years of experience in Brazil as President of the American Coffee Association.  In this capacity he had spent many years studying the production of this country's largest and most lucrative export.  Venezuela's most valuable export was oil.  Rockefeller was the majority shareholder of Creole Petroleum, the largest exporter of Venezuelan petroleum.  He owned a home at Monte Sacro ranch outside of Caracas, Venezuela and had been interested in development planning for Venezuela since launching the Venezuelan Development Company (VDC) in the late 1930s.⁸  

       An initial survey trip to Brazil in 1946 confirmed the board members' decision to first concentrate on agricultural development.  This solidified their commitment to the "the man, the girl, and the jeep" concept.  In their opinion, this efficient team structure offered the best and most cost effective way to "help people help themselves" in the rural backlands of Latin America.  The "man, the girl, and the jeep" enabled AIA to implement basic training relating to: 

1. supervised farm credit programs;  
2. extension services;  
3. demonstration services;  
4. vocational training;  
5. agricultural research centers;  
6. agricultural clubs; and  
7. building community centers where nutritional and sanitation lectures could be held 

 Structure and Organization  

      AIA's management team consisted of Nelson Rockefeller and a Board of Directors.  As noted in Figures 1 and 2, the board included Nelson's son Rodman Rockefeller and senior officers Wallace K. Harrison, Berent Friele, and John Camp.  

Figure 1 AIA Organizational Chart 

Source: Margaret Carroll, The Rockefeller Corollary, The Impact of Philanthropy and  Globalization in Latin America (Ph.D. diss., UCLA, 1999), 182    Figure 2 AIA Board of Directors and Officers

Directors	Officers
Louise A. Boyer	President Wallace K. Harrison
Berent Friele	Senior Vice President Berent Friele
Wallace K. Harrison	Executive Vice President John R. Camp
John E. Lockwood	Vice President Louise A. Boyer
Lawrence H. Levy	Treasurer Lawrence H. Levy
Arthur T. Proudfit	Comptroller/Asst. Treasurer W. Neil Pierce
Nelson A. Rockefeller	Secretary Flor P. Brennan
Rodman C. Rockefeller	Assistant Secretary John French
	Assistant Secretary Sonia K. Schultz

 Source: Martha Dalrymple, The AIA Story, Two Decades of International Cooperation  (New York: American International Association for Economic and Social Development, 1968)  

       AIA President Wallace K. Harrison was a world-renowned architect.  During the course of his career he worked on the Rockefeller Plaza (1932-40), the Avila Hotel in Caracas, Venezuela (1939), the General Assembly and Library at the United Nations Headquarters (1949), the Metropolitan Opera House at Lincoln Center (1966), and the Empire State Plaza in Albany, New York (1973).  His architectural style earned him the distinction of having the New York Post ascertain that he "single-handedly transformed New York into a forest of clean-lined rectangular glass slabs."⁹  During World War II, Harrison worked closely with Nelson Rockefeller as Director of Cultural Affairs and member of a secret psychological warfare team at the Office of Inter-American Affairs (OIAA).  When Rockefeller was appointed Assistant Secretary of State for Latin American Affairs in 1945, Harrison was made Director of OIAA.  He returned to the private sector in 1946 and immediately joined Rockefeller in creating AIA.  For Harrison, AIA's was “all about people — not money, not administrative organization, not a fine headquarters setup, not even all the publications.”¹⁰  

       During the first fourteen years of its existence, AIA had no formal headquarters.  The Rockefeller family's personal space at 5600 Rockefeller Center served as an unofficial administrative office.  Senior Vice President Berent Friele and Executive Vice President John Camp oversaw the organization's day-to-day activities.  Both were OIAA veterans like Harrison.  Friele, a naturalized American citizen who had been born in Norway, worked with Nelson Rockefeller on various other for-profit projects.  In addition, he helped organize the Brazilian-American Chamber of Commerce and was also an active member of the National Foreign Trade Council, Scandinavian Airlines, the Pan American Society, and the Council on Foreign Relations.¹¹  John Camp, a veteran of OIAA's Food Supply program in Paraguay was the senior operative in the field.  It was his job was to negotiate contracts and agreements with local governments.  

       When Nelson Rockefeller initially called his attorney John Lockwood in 1946 and asked him to begin work on legally incorporating AIA, he explained that he wanted to establish a hybrid company that was 33% for-profit and 66% non-profit.  Conceptually, the for-profit section of the company would turn over its profits to fund the social service projects organized by the non-profit section.  Lockwood told Rockefeller that this simply was not possible under American law.  For-profit activities could not be co-mingled with non-profit activities.  This strict legal separation was necessary to distinguish between profit-making endeavors subject to U.S. taxes and philanthropic projects not subject to U.S. taxes.  Lockwood advised Rockefeller to stick with a traditional structure with "[o]ne of these [companies] a Sunday company and one a weekday company.  ... That is in the historical, puritan, and Protestant tradition of this country — make money all week and tend to your eleemosynary operations on Sunday."¹²  Based on this advice, Rockefeller organized AIA in 1946 and created a separate for-profit company, IBEC (International Basic Economy Corporation) in 1947.  He, his son Rodman Rockefeller, and Berent Friele served as board members on both organizations.  
 

AIA Brazil 

       AIA's first operations were launched in Brazil in 1946.  Both Berent Friele and Nelson Rockefeller had many personal contacts in Brazil, which facilitated establishing new projects and hiring staff.  Brazil had been host to OIAA's largest operations during the World War II.  As head of these activities from 1941-1944, Friele's responsibilities had included advising the U.S. Ambassador, interacting with the Brazilian press, coordinating efforts with the Brazilian military, and administering extensive medical, sanitation and food supply services in Brazil's Northeastern and Amazon regions.  These activities had been closely followed in the Brazilian press and the Brazilian public had developed a very favorable image of OIAA and its leadership.  As OIAA's chief decision-maker, Nelson Rockefeller was considered by most Brazilians to be the American most interested in U.S.-Brazilian relations.  When he visited Brazil in 1946 and again in 1948 to promote AIA and IBEC, the Brazilian press hailed his arrival.¹³  

        During AIA's twenty-two year existence, the Brazilian projects totaled $3.48 or an approximate 30% of the overall $11.75 million budget.  This accounted for three distinct types of operations.  Training and demonstration projects received the smallest part of the Brazilian budget.  Funding for farm credit projects (known as ACAR) ranked second.  IRI discussed in greater detail below received the bulk of the monies allocated to the Brazilian program.  

       Robert W. Hudgens, an expert from the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Farm Security Administration was hired to head AIA Brazil.  Other employees included Walter Crawford, Dr. John B. Griffing, and Marcos Pereira.  Crawford had worked with John Camp in Paraguay in OIAA's Food Supply Division.  He was responsible for developing AIA's farm credit program.  Griffing, an agronomist and former Protestant missionary headed up agricultural demonstration projects with the help of his Brazilian assistant Marcos Pereira.  

       It was Hudgens and Crawford who first conceived of the term "the man, the girl, and the jeep."¹⁴  Their first efforts began in the small rural towns of Santa Rita do Passa Quatro and São José do Rio Pardo located in São Paulo state.  AIA specialists trained local Brazilian farmers to spray cattle against infection and disease and to construct trench silos.  They helped build community centers as a place to organize 4-S agricultural service clubs and organize home economics training on nutrition and basic sanitation principles.  As the program expanded mobile medical units were purchased.  A nurse and physician were hired to travel between community centers providing general medical services.  

      AIA Brazil's farm credit program generated a good deal of interest in government and academic circles.  It began in 1948 with a visit from Nelson Rockefeller and his brother David, an executive banker in the Latin American division of Chase Manhattan Bank.  Working with the Governor of Minas Gerais state, the Rockefellers signed an agreement to help provide Brazilian farmers with credit to buy modern equipment including better hoes, mechanized tractors, fertilizers, and hybrid seeds.  AIA agreed to guarantee the loans.  This convinced the Minas Gerais Savings Bank to provide the capital.  Agricultural productivity increased leading Governor Kubitschek to eagerly renew the original agreement in 1952 and 1955.¹⁵  

       The farm credit program was known as ACAR, Associação de Crédito e Assistência Rural. Its operations were carefully analyzed by academics Arthur T. Mosher and Clifton R. Wharton, Jr.  In A Study of the Agricultural Program of ACAR in Brazil published in 1955, Mosher carefully studied the rate of agricultural increase and profiled the number and type of farmers enrolled in the program.  In “Aiding the Community: A New Philosophy For Foreign Operations,” printed in the Harvard Business Review in 1954 Wharton provided an overall perspective on how the program could stimulate rural and the overall Brazilian development.  Both men concluded that AIA was providing a positive and crucial facilitation role.  

       Governor Kubitschek was particularly pleased with the program. When he became President of Brazil in 1956, he asked the Rockefeller brothers for help in expanding ACAR throughout Brazil.   ACAR's Brazilian director João Napoleão de Andrade was appointed head of a new national project known as ABCAR.  AIA's role was to assist with drafting financial applications to international organizations.  Between 1956-1968, the Inter-American Development Bank and the Brazilian federal government donated $10 million to ABCAR.  These funds were administered to state agencies created on the ACAR model.  With the creation of this national program, AIA was able to relinquish its role as guarantor.  It turned over all technical consulting to ABCAR and Brazilian federal government.  In 1974, the Brazilian Ministry of Agriculture reorganized ABCAR and its state members into a new agency called Empresa Brasileira de Assistência Técnica Extensão Rural (EMBATER).¹⁶  
 

IRI—Agricultural Research in Brazil (1957-1968) 

      IRI, the IBEC Research Institute was initially, as its name implies, a research division of the International Basic Economy Corporation (IBEC).  This for-profit business venture invested in new industries in developing countries.  According to its official charter, its goal was to "develop various parts of the world, to increase the production and availability of goods, things, and services useful to the lives or livelihood of their peoples, and thus to better their standards of living."¹⁷  IBEC's investments ranged from financial services to agribusiness.  By 1967, it was valued at $200 million and had 130 subsidiaries in 33 countries around the world.  

       As a subsidiary of IBEC from 1947-1957, IRI's mission was twofold.  First, it provided scientific support to Sementes Agroceres, S.A. (SASA), a Brazilian hybrid seed company.¹⁸  Secondly, it performed research related to improving coffee productivity.  The company owned a 136,898-acre farm known as Cambuhy (Companhia Agricola Fazendas Paulistas) located near the village of Matão, approximately 200 miles northwest of the city of São Paulo.¹⁹  Here IRI scientists experimented with weed control, labor use, irrigation, harvesting, chemicals, and mechanization.²⁰  They also worked on developing instant coffee and enhancing the flavor of various different strains of Brazilian coffee.²¹  IRI's greatest scientific breakthrough during this "for-profit" period was the creation of a new vegetable hybrid called "IRI 1022," which helped add nitrogen and thus rejuvenate soil that had been worn out by repeated coffee plantings.²²  

       In 1956-1957, Nelson Rockefeller and IBEC's board of directors became increasingly concerned by the costs of IRI's experiments.  As this unit was simply not generating revenue, they approved legal advice to transfer it to AIA in 1957.²³  This decision was based on the determination that IRI's main function was to provide educational and scientific research.  According to U.S. law, this was a function of tax-exempt non-profit organizations such as AIA.  By making the transfer, IBEC was guaranteed to receive tax credits for any donations it made to support IRI's research.  

       IRI's tax-exempt status allowed the exploration of new opportunities.  Nelson Rockefeller had long been fascinated by the potential productivity of the campo cerrados, the vast stretches of uncultivated scrub-brush lands of Brazil's central plateau.  The area held a special, mystical lure in Brazilian culture.  It represented a vast frontier that symbolized the future.  In the late 1930's, Brazilian dictator Getúlio Vargas had begun to call for a "marcha para oeste"—a march to the west that included the establishment of a new capital in this region.  He believed this policy would integrate the vast cultural differences between the Brazilian elite living on the eastern seaboard and the Brazilians living in the backlands of the interior.  In the late 1950s Brazilian President Juscelino Kubitschek acted on Vargas' dream.  His decision to break ground for Brasília, "city of the future" captured the imagination of Brazilians and people around the world.²⁴  

       Nelson Rockefeller was fascinated by the Brazilian challenge of creating a new capital on the interior plateau lands of the campos cerrados.  Over the years, he had endeared himself to a cadre of Brazilian politicians by recounting that in 1942, U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt had told him that if he were a young man he would pick up and move to this region because it promised to “be the most important area of development in the world.”²⁵  In 1958 Nelson joined with his brother David in establishing agricultural experimental research stations aimed at figuring out how to grow crops in this region's distinct soil.  Initial experiments concentrated on identifying phosphorous and lime fertilizers that could neutralize aluminum soil compounds that inhibited crop growth.²⁶  

       The Brazilian "march to the west" energized AIA's leadership.  They believed that it not offered the possibility of solving the disproportionate gap in wealth between the Brazilian upper and lower classes, it also provided a feasible manner to address land reform.  The Cuban Revolution in 1959 had encouraged the development of an active, leftist peasant league in Northeast Brazil that was increasingly becoming more violent.  In February 1961, the unfolding Cuban Missile Crisis led concerned U.S. and Brazilian government officials to conclude that the Northeast might explode into another region under Communist revolt.²⁷  In this political climate, AIA senior vice president John Camp wrote to Rockefeller suggesting that if the uncultivated scrub-brush of the campos cerrados could be developed, landless peasants from the Northeast could migrate and prosper by creating fertile farms.  According to Camp,  

      “The ‘campos cerrados’ or forest enclosed open lands, are level and can be mechanically farmed.  AIA’s research division has demonstrated that these lands, with proper treatment by fertilizer and certain trace mineral elements can be made productive.  The orderly opening up and development of this area offers new settlement prospects for several million families and corollary employment opportunities for millions more in related commerce and industry.  

      With the right approach, this could be one of the most dramatic and at the same time beneficial enterprises ever undertaken anywhere.  It would help resolve several basic problems by developing new land and increasing food production for a growing population.  This could be a land reform program developed in a democratic tradition that would answer the ‘commune’ system of the Red Chinese and would dwarf the ‘virgin lands’ development program of the Soviet Union.”²⁸ 

       Camp was unable to put this vision into action.  Over the next two years, AIA's plans for IRI were abruptly curtailed due to budgetary problems.²⁹  In the six years since its transfer from IBEC to AIA, more than $2 million dollars in expenses had been incurred.  This was extreme given that the total budget for all AIA operations over twenty-two years only totaled $11.75 million.  IRI was restructured in 1963 as an independent non-profit organization.  This forced it to function as a separate organization responsible for its own budget and fundraising activities.  Work on the campos cerrados soil project was continued under special contract with the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID).  This encouraged IRI researchers to coordinate their work with scientists from various U.S. universities who were also under USAID contract.  Findings were shared with the Brazilian Ministry of Agriculture.  In 1967, the project received a tremendous financial boost when USAID provided $10 million in funding.³⁰  
 

AIA Venezuela 

     AIA launched its Venezuelan office in the midst of a very negative government campaign against the oil industry.  In 1945, Venezuelan President Rómulo Betancourt levied a 50% tax on all petroleum profits.  Three years later, Venezuelan dictator Marcos Perez Jiménez’ came to power promising to “sembrar el petroleo”— sow the oil profits into development projects.  He acted on this promise by rewriting Venezuelan oil laws and acquiring a portion of the oil industry for the Venezuelan public sector.³¹  He used royalties from the oil industry to underwrite large-scale public works projects.  Corruption was rampant in his administration and the dictator amassed a fortune by taking commissions from development projects.³²  

      In this atmosphere Rockefeller, a majority shareholder of the largest oil company in Venezuela opened AIA's new Venezuela office.  He persuaded other U.S. oil companies such as Shell, Mobil, and Gulf that there was a public relations value in contributing to AIA Venezuela.  He wanted AIA to serve as an example of his earnest and sincere commitment to help with raising the standard of living for all Venezuelans.  For Rockefeller, funding AIA was a way to demonstrate that he, his oil company, and other American businessmen were sincerely interested in the socio-economic development of Venezuela.  

CBR — Consejo de Bienestar Rural  

       Like AIA Brazil, the Venezuelan office decided to concentrate first on agricultural development.  In 1948, the country was suffering from a severe food shortage that forced it to import foodstuffs.  AIA’s goal was to help put new lands into food production with the use of technology and training.  Its strategy was to implement the same "man, girl and the jeep" concept already in operation in Brazil.  AIA Venezuela's initial goals were similar to programs that were already under development in Brazil.  They emphasized:  

1.  creating and administering a farm credit system  
2.  constructing community centers  
3.  constructing roads linking rural villages with highway arteries and cities  
4.  developing vocational schools  
5.  developing extension programs  
6.  organizing agricultural clubs 

       To achieve these goals, AIA Venezuela joined into a partnership contract from 1948-1968 with the Venezuelan government's Technical Institute for Immigration and Colonization.³³  Under Venezuelan law, this contract could only be signed by two Venezuelan legal entities.  To comply, AIA incorporated a Venezuelan subsidiary non-profit organization under Venezuelan law known as the Consejo de Bienestar Rural (CBR).  

       Overall, CBR received 26% of AIA's total $11.75 million dollar budget.  Its most successful program was organizing agricultural clubs and disseminating basic nutrition and sanitation information.  In 1954, with help from Venezuela's Ministry of Education, CBR developed a technical training school in the state of Aragua that focused on agricultural, health and sanitation courses.  At San Felipe in the Yaracuy valley, it stationed two mobile machinery-training units.  Both training centers helped address Venezuela's lack of trained personnel and set the standard for vocational training programs.  

       Unlike AIA's experience with ACAR, the Brazil's farm credit program, CBR was unable to acquire the full support of the Venezuelan government for this type of program.  CBR tenously operated a crdit project for six years from 1948-1954.  It was ultimately shut down by Perez Jiménez' restrictive banking laws.  Following the dictator's ouster from government and return to civilian constitutional rule under President Rómulo Betancourt in 1958-1959, CBR's farm credit project was assumed by Edgardo Mondolfi at the Venezuelan Ministry of Agriculture.³⁴  

CIDEA — Consejo Interamericano de Educación Alimenticia 

       In the early 1950's, AIA Venezuela entered into a second contract with the Venezuelan government's Health Ministry and Institute of Public Nutrition (Instituto Pro-Alimentación Popular).  The Venezuelan non-profit organization, Consejo Interamericano de Educación Alimenticia (CIDEA) was created to implement this contract.  It was responsible for conducting a media campaign on nutrition and sanitation using visual and written educational materials.  H. Schuyler Bradt, a veteran industrial film producer who had started his career with the U.S. Navy was hired to design CIDEA’s public service announcements.  In addition to radio and television commercials, he successfully designed a mini-soap opera series and the comic strip Juancito Salud.  The soap operas ran five days a weeks and the content was approximately 80 percent agricultural and 20 percent home economics.  CIDEA produced Venezuela's first comic books.  Three different books were produced with a combined distribution of nearly 300,000 copies.³⁵  

       CIDEA eventually expanded its campaign to include mobile units that trucked film screens and projectors into rural areas to show informational films.  When CIDEA's contract with the Venezuelan government expired in 1956 Dr. Ali Romero at the Venezuelan Institute of Public Nutrition assumed responsibility for all ongoing activities.³⁶  
 

Inter-American Projects (1958-1968) 

       In 1958, AIA's Board of Directors decided to launch two inter-American programs. The first program was only moderately successful.  PIIP, the Programa Interamericano de Información Popular aimed at providing Latin American government officials with basic communications and media training.³⁷  Schuyler Bradt, head of the Venezuelan CIDEA nutrition and healthcare campaign was recruited to work on this program.  U.S. newspaperman Calvert Anderson joined him in setting up a training center in Costa Rica.  They offered courses in press, radio, publications, public relations, and presentation.  As the program evolved, Brandt and Anderson became traveling consultants under contract to Peru's Technical Office of Agrarian Information, Colombia's Institute for Agrarian Reform, and Argentina's National Technical Agricultural Institute.³⁸  

       The second inter-American program was an extension of AIA's success in organizing local agricultural clubs in Brazil and Venezuela.  The mission of PIJR, Programa Interamericano de Juventud Rural was to develop a network of 4-H agricultural club system throughout the Western Hemisphere.  Howard Law, head organizer of AIA Venezuela's agricultural club system lobbied prominent businessmen and policymakers to support this new regional program.  Fortuitously he secured sponsorship from O.A.S. officials Dr. José Mora and Galo Plaza, as well as U.S. business groups such as the North American Committee in Peru, Esso and Bank of America.  PIJR coordinated its efforts from the outset with other related non-profit organizations such as IFYE (International Farm Youth Exchange) and the U.S. National 4-H Club Foundation.  In late 1967, the U.S. National 4-H Foundation agreed to incorporate all PIJR clubs and organizations as international chapters of its organization.  
 

Working With USAID in Chile and Brazil (1961-68) 

       Between 1961-1968, AIA experimented with working under contract for USAID.  Ernest Maes, former director of AIA Venezuela was sent to Chile to work with the Chilean government on rebuilding primary schools in Victoria province that had been destroyed by the 1960 earthquake.  AIA's budget for this project was $525,864 dollars with most of the funding coming from a donation by the Rockefeller Brothers Fund.  AIA signed a legal agreement with the Chilean Ministry of Education and Development Corporation (CORFO) to set up a Special Commission for Rural Education for the province of Victoria.  Under this contract, AIA paid for construction of the schools and the government paid for land, furniture, administrative and personnel expenses between 1962-1965.  In addition to construction efforts, Maes assisted with the design of a new skills-based learning program.  

      Plan Victoria was so successful and popular that schools in the adjacent Chilean province of Nuble requested support to develop the same type of program.  Not having the funds to commit to another program, AIA arranged a contract with USAID in which AIA provided the consulting and USAID paid for the construction costs.  

       AIA tried to replicate the success it had with acting as a field consultant in Chile with PIDR (Programa Interamericano Desenvolvimento Rural).  This was AIA's third inter-American program.  It was established in 1961 to plan recolonization and land reform projects.   Louis Heaton, a member of AIA Venezuela office was given the task of writing grant and contract proposals.  Between 1962-1968, his successful proposals provided $31 million in funding from the Inter-American Development Bank and USAID.  Of this amount, USAID provided $10 million to develop a Venezuela fruit industry and rehabilitate the Venezuelan farm credit system CBR had piloted from 1948-1954.³⁹  The Inter-American Development Bank donated $5.1 million for re-colonization projects in Costa Rica ($1.6 million) and Bolivia ($3.5 million).⁴⁰  

       Walter Crawford former head of AIA Brazil's farm credit program oversaw PIDR's efforts in Brazil.  His book Agriculture in Brazil, The Moods, The Reality and The Promise published in 1960 provided a detailed analysis of how Brazil should implement land reform through planned colonization projects.⁴¹  Crawford submitted this publication along with a $110 million proposal to Kennedy’s Alliance For Progress team.  AIA's Senior Vice President Berent Friele and Executive Vice President John Camp followed up with a concerted lobbying effort to consolidate political support for the proposal.  Friele met with Adolf Berle, head of the President Kennedy’s Alliance for Progress team.  He requested that Berle send Lincoln Gordon, Kennedy’s Ambassador in Brazil a copy of Crawford's proposal.  To reinforce AIA's interest, John Camp met with Richard Goodwin, another senior member of Kennedy's Alliance For Progress team.⁴²  

       President Kennedy assigned Merwin Bohan to review the PIDR proposal and AIA's Brazilian field operations.  After returning from a trip to the Brazilian Northeast, Bohan recommended that the Alliance For Progress allocate $150 million to AIA's rural development and colonization plans in the central plateau region of the states of Goiás and Mato Grosso.⁴³  This decision was reversed in 1961 when the Kennedy administration suspended all rural development funding in Brazil due to peasant unrest.  The Brazilian government concurred with this decision adding a request that any future USAID efforts be made in the state of Maranhão and not in the Central Plateau region.⁴⁴  This policy hurt PIDR's planned Jaíba recolonization project that envisioned relocating 1,000 families in the São Francisco River valley at a cost of $7.5 million.  Lack of state government approval and outside funding forced PIDR to abandon this project in 1962.⁴⁵  

      One successful PIDR venture in Brazil was a collaborative project with the Brazilian Antunes Foundation in 1964.  Together these non-profit organizations funded the Campos Project, a plan to diversify the sugar driven economy of Paraíba River delta in Rio de Janeiro state.  The Brazilian Bank for Cooperatives and the Inter-American Development Bank helped with funding for this endeavor.  They decreased the region's dependence on sugar exports by establishing a dairy co-operative.  In the 1970's, the Antunes Foundation used this model to develop the Development Institute in the state of Amapá.  
  

Private Funds  

       Funding was from the beginning an issue for AIA.  Overall, a majority of the organization's monies came from Nelson Rockefeller’s personal fortune with additional support from other members of the Rockefeller family.  The lack of outside resources proved problematic and in the end was one of several reasons for terminating the organization.  Nelson found it difficult to raise funds from other corporations and individuals.  Robert Hudgens head of AIA Brazil recounts that after being rejected by Coca-Cola, Rockefeller came to the conclusion that other private corporations and individuals simply “did not want to put money into something that [was] going to prove that Nelson Rockefeller is a world-wide philanthropist.”⁴⁶  

      Surprisingly, Nelson Rockefeller was even rejected in his fundraising efforts for AIA by his father.  John D. Rockefeller Jr. expressed disinterest in AIA in spite of Nelson assertion that the organization carried “on with the courage and vision that led you and Grandfather to pioneer new fields and blaze new trails.”  Nelson felt it was important for his father to support AIA as he represented “a symbol to people throughout the world that democracy and the capitalistic system are interested in their well-being.”  Finally, he explained that AIA offered hope in the fight against underdevelopment because it promised to give people a “reason to feel that their best interest and opportunity for the future were identified with our country and our way of life.”⁴⁷  

       In spite of his father's lack of interest in AIA, Nelson Rockefeller was successful in cajoling his sister and brothers to contribute.   In fact, 52.4% or $7,605,000 of AIA's overall budget came from the Rockefeller family or related charitable organizations such as the Rockefeller Brothers Fund.⁴⁸  The second largest contribution category amounting to $5,695,000 or 39.2% of total funding was donated by U.S. oil companies operating in Venezuela such as Creole, Shell, Mene Grande (Gulf), International and Mobil).  Ultimately, Nelson Rockefeller was only able to persuade other third-party corporations and individuals to contribute 8.4% or $1,224,000 to AIA’s total funding.⁴⁹  

        As noted below in Figures 3 and 4, over the course of 22 years, AIA's largest budget expenditures (69%) were allocated to the Brazilian and Venezuelan programs.  In Brazil, the credit program (ACAR) received 12%, agricultural research under IRI was granted 17%, and only 1% went to fund demonstration and training programs that ran on "the man, the girl, and the jeep" concept.  In the end, the budget for the Brazil office comprised 30% of the total AIA budget.  Venezuela's CBR received the largest portion (26%) of the total budget.  This coupled with 6% of the funds going to CIDEA's nutrition program and another 7% for training, research, and grants equaled 39% of the final budget.  The three inter-American projects launched in the 1960s to address media training (PIIP), agricultural youth clubs (PIJR), and recolonization (PIDR) received 26% of the final budget.  The remaining 5% was allocated to rebuilding schools in Chile (Plan Victoria, 4%) and other miscellaneous projects and grants (1%).  

  Figure 3 AIA Program Expenditures (1946-1968)

BRAZIL
Demonstration, training and experimental programs (1946-51)	63,557
ACAR, ABCAR and related activities (1948-63)	1,387,442
IRI program (1957-63)	2,029,820
Sub-total	3,480,819
VENEZUELA
Inter-American Institute of Agricultural Sciences (1947-52)	189,861
Program planning (1949-53, 1954)	20,973
CIDEA (1948-56)	756,436
CBR (1948-68)	2,988,476
Vocational teacher training (1952-57)	311,484
Direct grants and misc. projects (1948, '49, '51, '52, '55, '56)	107,525
IRI program (1951-53)	140,000
Sub-total	4,514,755
INTER-AMERICAN PROGRAMS
PIIP - Information Program (1959-68)	1,402,020
PIJR - Rural Youth Program (1960-67)	1,015,983
PIDR - Recolonization/Rural Development Program (1962-68)	640,548
Sub-total	3,058,551
OTHER PROGRAMS
Indian Cooperative Union Ltd. (1951-57)	102,146
Grants to other non-profit organizations (1953-54)	63,000
Chile-"Plan Victoria" rural education (1962-66)	525,864
Sub-total	691,010
TOTAL:	11,745,135

Source: Martha Dalrymple, The AIA Story, Two Decades of International Cooperation  (New York: American International Association for Economic and Social Development, 1968), 269  
 
  Figure 4 Pie Chart - AIA Projects as Percentage of the Total Budget

Source: Martha Dalrymple, The AIA Story, Two Decades of International Cooperation  (New York: American International Association for Economic and Social Development, 1968), 269 

Reasons for Terminating AIA 

      AIA operated on a small budget.  Although this was a challenge for AIA's staff, it only one of several reasons for closing the non-profit organization in 1968.  Three other factors coalesced in favor of termination.  First, although AIA was Nelson Rockefeller's personal project, he did not believe his wealth could successfully underwrite a permanent development program for the Third World.  Second, Nelson Rockefeller and AIA senior management quickly encountered pressure on the limited financial resources because they rapidly expanded their original objective from the original "man, girl, and the jeep" concept to agricultural research as well as credit and exchange programs.  Third, Rockefeller had originally conceived of a hybrid structure with a 66% for profit sector that under wrote the non-profit projects of the other 33% of the company.  Fundraising was not his strongest skill and he was not prepared to dedicate large amounts of his time to this function.  

       Why did Nelson Rockefeller not allocate funds from his successful for-profit company IBEC to underwrite AIA?  It is odd that he did not do this given that he had originally conceived of AIA and IBEC as separate but equal units within one umbrella corporation.  IBEC's mission was to invest in basic industry projects in the Third World.  As this company was quite successful, he could easily have authorized donations that would have kept AIA in business and given IBEC sizable tax deductions.  

       Nelson Rockefeller deliberately allowed AIA to wither away without providing assets from IBEC or other sources because he believed that ultimately, the U.S. government (not the private sector) was responsible for international development.  During World War II he had been a strong proponent of developing permanent U.S. government programs to address global problems such as hunger, poverty, and improper nutrition.  The only reason he had backed away from this agenda to create AIA as a private non-profit organization was because President Truman had fired him as Assistant Secretary of State for Latin American Affairs and abruptly curtailed the government aid projects he had just spent four years building up.  Rockefeller felt personally responsible for these projects.  He was mindful of all the promises he had made in Latin America that he would help secure long-term development assistance following the war.   He created AIA in order to continue the work of a handful of these projects with his own personal funds.  It was never his intention use his entire fortune to fund long-term development. Rather, he believed that U.S. government had a moral obligation to assume this responsibility.  

      During the 1950's and 1960's while still acting as head of AIA, Rockefeller took every opportunity to promote the creation of a government agency for development.  In 1950, President Truman appointed him head of a long-term executive committee on "Point IV" known as the International Development Advisory Board (IDAB).  This group's findings were published in 1951 as Partners in Progress.  In this publication's foreword Nelson Rockefeller outlined ways that private sector could support Truman's plan for private aid.  However, he could not resist from inserting support for the eventually development of a strong government development agency to led the way in this arena.⁵⁰  

      Nelson Rockefeller's other activities, outside of AIA and the IDAB reveal his strong commitment to persuading the U.S. government to develop a long-term, large-scale foreign aid program.  In 1953, he left his position as Chairman of AIA to join the Eisenhower Administration.  According to Martha Dalrymple, historian for AIA he "remain[ed] close to the organization intellectually and emotionally."⁵¹  While this may have been true, his new activities must have soon consumed his energies as they would earn him a reputation as “Coldest Warrior of Them All” due to his staunch opposition to the international expansion of Communism.⁵²  As President Dwight Eisenhower's Special Assistant from 1953-1955 he organized Quantico I and Quantico II.  These conferences drafted a comprehensive plan for the Cold War that proposed spending $18 billion over the next six years.⁵³  This bold proposal left fiscally conservative U.S. Treasury Secretary George Humphrey aghast, leading him to block Rockefeller's promotion within the Department of Defense because he was a “big spender."  

      Thwarted in his efforts to develop a large-scale military spending budget to fight the Cold War, Rockefeller resigned and entered the political world.   As Governor of New York he ran in 1960, 1964, and 1968 for the Republican nomination for President.  The majority of his positions were developed during a special study project funded by the Rockefeller Brothers Fund from 1957-1960 known as Prospect For America.  This project brought together six policy panels composed of hundreds of experts.  Participants such as Dean Rusk and Henry Kissinger later became responsible for implementing these policies during the Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon and Ford administrations.⁵⁴  Prospect for America reiterated Nelson Rockefeller's strong underlying belief that the United States government had a moral obligation to promote development in the Third World.  Without out this, Nelson believed that poor nations were very susceptible to falling under Communist control.  

       During the Republican Presidential primary in the spring of 1960, Richard Nixon defeated Nelson Rockefeller to secure the Republican nomination.  Later that fall, while Democratic Presidential candidate John F. Kennedy prepared to debate Nixon on national television, he reviewed Prospect For America and Rockefeller's call for a permanent U.S. development agency.  Within months of winning the election, Kennedy acted on this recommendation and established the U.S. Agency for International Development.⁵⁵  That same year, he allocated funds for the Alliance For Progress, a large-scale economic development plan that had been proposed by President Eisenhower and Rockefeller's friend, founder of Brasília, Brazilian President Juscelino Kubitschek.  The Alliance for Progress was part of the Punta del Este Charter ratified by the Organization of American States.  It committed the United States and international lending agencies to providing $10 billion in long-term development aid.  This amount was to be matched with funds from the private sector.⁵⁶  

       Once President Kennedy established USAID as a permanent U.S. development agency and committed to the Alliance For Progress it was only a matter of time until Rockefeller closed AIA.  As early as 1961, he noted in a letter to John Camp that "AIA was a pioneer [but]… [f]or the long pull, it seems to me that this field is clearly a government field.”⁵⁷  For the next seven years, AIA advocated a policy that promoted their employees as field consultants with years of expert experience in Latin America.  Given AIA's tight budget and Nelson's commitment to other projects that precluded an aggressive fundraising campaign, AIA's leadership was interested in finding ways to tap into government funds flowing into USAID and Alliance for Progress projects.  This approach worked in the case of the Chilean Plan Victoria earthquake school construction.  It worked to some extent with the IRI campos cerrados research project once IRI became its own separate legal entity. In the case of the PIDR recolonization projects this policy failed because U.S. and Brazilian government officials made other plans without including AIA leaders in the decision-making process.  
  

Conclusion 

 AIA's legacy is important to foreign policy experts in the 21st century for the following reasons:  

First, AIA provides a historical link between the first, nascent, U.S. development projects established in Latin America under OIAA from 1942-1945 as wartime emergency aid.  Personnel that worked on these temporary projects were hired by AIA after President Truman terminated OIAA.  This transferal of knowledge to AIA provided an unbroken link that allowed these international development professionals to offer their expertise to newly created USAID programs in 1961.  This demonstrates how private, non-profit organizations such as AIA may and can step in to provide continuity during periods when public sector funding for international aid programs shrink due to changes in political and/or economic priorities.

Second, AIA provides a historical model of how small non-profit organizations can work with large government programs such as USAID to foster development at local, state and national levels.  From 1961 through 1968, AIA's small, well-trained technical staff provided specific consulting services to enhance USAID's programs, which were still in a very early stage of development and oversee by inexperienced staff. Already in existence for fifteen years at the time USAID was founded, AIA served as the first consultant service to this new permanent foreign aid agency.  In this capacity AIA employees managed to the best degree they could the inherent conflict between a large bureaucratic institution and a small, privately funded non-profit.  The Kennedy "New Frontiersmen" that staffed USAID in the 1960s were endowed with a large budget and little practical field experience.  In contrast, AIA employees who had served with OIAA had at 15 to 20 years of practical knowledge in Latin America but were restricted by a tight budget.  AIA's experience dealing with bureaucratic regulations and procedures provides a historical example for non-profit organizations and civil society projects in similar situations today.

Thirdly, with its initial and simple "the man, the girl, and the jeep" concept, AIA demonstrated that limited funds could achieve concrete results.  This method allowed for the successful implementation of targeted training programs in selected towns within a limited region of two given countries (Brazil and Venezuela).  AIA's termination provides an example of what happens when programs are expanded without the organization's leadership being committed to a concrete fundraising plan.  It demonstrates that any non-profit organization (even one funded by a Rockefeller) can wither if its leadership moves on to other outside projects without focusing on the establishment of an endowment to ensure future plans.  

Lastly, AIA provides an historical example to local non-profit organizations interested in enlarging the participation of civil society in policy decisions.  When AIA arrived in Venezuela there were no other foundations, when it left in 1960s there were more than 28 foundations in existence.⁵⁸  In Brazil, the number of non-profit organizations and foundations also grew.  AIA was a pioneer in the fields of both international development and philanthropy.  It paved the way for the creation and expansion of the non-profit section in the developing world.

Endnotes 

¹  The Foreign Assistance Act of September 4, 1961 separated military and non-military aid and authorized President John F. Kennedy to create a permanent agency to administer economic assistance.  He established the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) on November 3, 1961.  Prior to this development, the United States had only established temporary aid programs beginning with the work of the Office for Inter-American Affairs (OIAA).  This agency's work was terminated in 1946 and any ongoing projects were transferred to the U.S. Department of State.  In 1948, the Economic Cooperation Act created the Marshall Plan.  This ended on June 30, 1951.  Under the first Mutual Security Act of October 31, 1951, military and economic aid programs were consolidated under the Mutual Security Agency, a division of the U.S. State Department structure.  In 1953, the Foreign Operations Administration was created as an independent government agency to consolidate all foreign programs administered by the federal government.  This organization was abolished by the Mutual Security Act of 1954, which ordered a reorganization of programs under the International Cooperation Administration (ICA), a division of the State Department.  ICA generated several new concepts such as security aid and Food for Peace but it did not address long-range development planning.  U.S., Agency for International Development, A History of Foreign Assistance [March 2001] <www.usaid.gov/about/usaidhist.html>  

²  Martha Dalrymple, The AIA Story, Two Decades of International Cooperation (New York: American International Association for Economic and Social Development, 1968) 63.  

³  Ibid, 64.  

⁴  The Office of Inter-American Affairs (OIAA) was special wartime agency under the Office of the Executive during World War II.  It was created by order of the Council of National Defense on 16 August 1940 and was terminated by Executive Order No. 9710 on 10 April 1946.    

⁵  U.S. Congress, Senate, Committee on Appropriations, Economic Cooperation Administration, Hearings Before The Committee On Appropriations, United States Senate, Eightieth Congress, Second Session On Economic Cooperation Administration, H.R. 6801, A Bill Making Appropriations For Foreign Aid For The Period Beginning April 3, 1948, And Ending June 30, 1949 (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1948).  

⁶  Papers of Harry S. Truman, Inaugural Address of 20 Jan. 1949, The Avalon Project at the Yale Law School [February 2001] <www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/presiden/inaug/truman.htm>  

⁷  Robert W. Hudgens, "Planning A Development Program," and Robert P. Russell, "Exporting American Agricultural Technology," in Beardsley Ruml, ed., The Manual of Corporate Giving (Washington, D.C.: National Planning Association, 1952), 385-398; and Jonathan B. Bingham, Shirt-Sleeve Diplomacy: Point 4 In Action (New York: J. Day Co., 1953).  

⁸  VDC was also known by it Spanish name Compañía Anónima de Fomento Venezolano.  It was only in existence between 1938-1939.  It was organized by Nelson Rockefeller, Wallace K. Harrison, social scientist and econo-mist Beardsley Ruml, Chase Manhattan Bank executive Joseph Rovensky, and President Roosevelt’s nephew, E. H. Robbins.  They persuaded several American oil companies to provide initial funding for the organization.  Their first plan was for construction of a modern hotel in Caracas.  Building began on the Hotel Avila in Caracas in late 1939. Unfortunately, all other plans were curtailed when Rockefeller joined the Office of Inter-American Affairs (OIAA) in late 1939.    

⁹  "Wallace K. Harrison," Celebrity Register, An Irreverent Compendium of American Quotable Notables (New York: Harper & Row, 1963), 274.  

¹⁰  Dalrymple, 187.  

¹¹  "Berent Friele," Who's Who in America, 38th ed. (Chicago: Marquis Who's Who, Inc., 1974).  

¹²  Dalrymple, 9-10.  

¹³  “Rio Hails Rockefeller; Ex-Diplomat to Foster Better Crops and Herds in Brazil," New York Times, 7 Sept. 1948, p. 35, col. 5; and "Returns From Brazil; Nelson Rockefeller Reports Living Standards Up," New York Times, 20 Sept. 1948, p. 9, col. 7.  

¹⁴  Dalrymple, 43.  

¹⁵  "Rockefellers Guests In Brazil," New York Times, 13 Apr. 1956, 4; and “Facts About ACAR,” 29 Dec. 1955, Folder 115, Box 16, Series E, AIA-IBEC, Record Group 4 (RG 4), Rockefeller Archive Center, Tarrytown, New York (RAC).    

¹⁶  Arthur T. Mosher, A Study of the Agricultural Program of ACAR in Brazil (Washington National Planning Association, 1955 and Clifton R. Wharton Jr. "Aiding the Community: A New Philosophy for Foreign Operations," Harvard Business Review, 32:2 (March/April 1954), 64-72.  Wharton expounded on his article in Subsistence Agriculture and Economic Development (Chicago: Aldine, 1969).  

¹⁷  Dalrymple, 12.  

¹⁸  SASA was organized in 1948 with Brazilian partners Antonio Secundino and Gladstone Drummond.  IBEC provided the initial capital for setting up a corn seed company in Minas Gerais.  In 1967, total output reached 14,300 tons making SASA one of the largest hybrid seed producers in the world.  IBEC sold its portion of SASA to the Secundino family in 1972.  At this time, the Brazilian National Development Bank (BNDE) estimated its value at $9 million. Secundino’s son Ney Bittencourt de Araujo followed in his father's footsteps and was named 1986 “Brazilian Agronomist of the Year.”  In 1990 SASA was valued at $90 million and it was exporting corn seed to neighboring Bolivia and Paraguay.  For more on SASA see Elizabeth Ann Cobbs, “‘Good Works at a Profit,’: Private Development and United States-Brazil Relations 1946-1960 (Ph.D. diss., Stanford University, 1988), 220 citing  O Estado de Sao Paulo, 22 Oct. 1986; and Elizabeth Ann Cobbs, Rich Neighbor: Rockefeller and Kaiser In Brazil (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1992), 156-157 and 184-85.  

¹⁹  IRI’s agricultural farm was acquired by the Rockefellers’ partner, Brazilian financier and banker, Walther Moreira Salles and his business group Cia. Santo Anselmo.  Walther Moreira Salles was one of two foreigners on IBEC’s Board of Directors.  

²⁰  “Companhia Agricola Fazendas Paulistas General Description of Property,” 1, Folder 15, Box 2, Series B, AIA-IBEC, RG 4, RAC; “New Techniques in Coffee Production,” 1 June 1956, John Griffing, Folder 2, Box 2, Series B, AIA-IBEC, RG 4, RAC; AIA-IBEC Progress Report, 3, Box 2, Series B, AIA-IBEC, RG 4, RAC; and Letter from Robert Purcell to Nelson Rockefeller, “Brazilian Acceptance of IRI Information,” 25 April 1958, 2, Folder 75, Box 8, Series B, AIA-IBEC, RG 4, RAC.  

²¹  In hopes of generating new revenue for the Brazilian coffee industry, IRI’S Dr. Mehrlich began extensive coffee taste-testing experiments at the Cambuhy farm in 1954.  The plan was to create a new soluble coffee product for the U.S company Tenco.  Letter From John Lockwood to Nelson Rockefeller re Soluble Coffee - IBEC Research Institute, 13 Jan. 1954, Folder 15, Box 2, Series B, AIA-IBEC, RG 4, RAC.  

²²  Dalrymple, 26.  

²³  Letter from Lawrence H. Levy to John French re IRI - Coffee Flavor, 12 Nov. 1953, Folder 15, Box 2, Series B, AIA-IBEC, RG 4, RAC.  

²⁴  For more on the concept of Brazilian westward expansion see Lewis Tambs, “March To The West: A Geopolitical Analysis Of Brazilian Expansion” (Ph.D. diss., University of California, Santa Barbara, 1967).  For more on Juscelino Kubitschek’s plans for Brasília see Hélio Silva, Juscelino, o Desenvolvimento, 1956-61 (São Paulo: Grupo de Comunicação Três, 1983).  

²⁵  Dalrymple, 169.  

²⁶  IRI 1959 Progress Report, Folder 61, Box 7, Series B, AIA-IBEC, RG 4, RAC; and John Camp, “Tierras desaprovechadas; los vastos campos cerrados del Brasil” Americas (Aug. 1963), 13-14; and Letter from President Jerome Harrington to Researcher Jonathan Garst, 18 October 1961, Series B, AIA-IBEC, RG 4, RAC.  

²⁷  For more on labor and peasant unrest in Northeast Brazil in the early 1960’s see Serafino Romualdi, Presidents and Peons; Recollections Of A Labor Ambassador In Latin America (New York, Funk & Wagnalls, 1967).  

²⁸  Letter from John R. Camp to Nelson Rockefeller, 24 Feb.1961, 9, Folder 6, Box 1, John Camp Papers, Series I, AIA-IBEC, RG 4, RAC.  For more background on Camp’s concept of developing the Brazilian interior see Camp, “Tierras desaprovechadas," 11-14.  

²⁹  Between 1957-1963, the private and corporate donors listed below made contributions to IRI.  Robert Purcell oversaw the 1958 fundraising campaign.  This led to prospective meetings with the Junqueira Foundation, Anderson Clayton Brazil, other Brazilian industrial groups, and U.S. agricultural chemical companies.  American Export Potash was the first to grant a small modest research grant.  Letter from Robert Purcell to Nelson Rockefeller, “Fund Raising Activities,” 15 March 1958, 1-4, Folder 75, Box 8, Series B, AIA-IBEC, RG 4, RAC.  A list of IRI contributors includes: Amaral, Machado & Cia, Ltda., American Export Potash; Anderson Clayton & Cia., Ltda., Banco do Comércio e Indústria de São Paulo; Climax Molybdenum Co.; Companhia de Superfosfatos C Produtos Químicos; Companhia Industrial e Administrativa S. Francisco; Companhia Itaú de Fertilizantes; Companhia Paulista de Adubos; Companhia Rhodia Brasileira; Copas S.A.; Cotton Association; Elekeiroz Produtos Químicos; Esso Brasileira de Petroleo S.A.; Esteve Irmãos S.A. Comércio e Indústria; Fazenda Alvorada; Fazenda Santa Tereza; Fazenda Ubatuba; Filibra Produtas Quimicas Ltda.; Ford Foundation; Frigorifico Anglo S.A.; Gesso Nacional Tapuyo Ltda.; Indústrias Reunidas F. Matarazzo S.A.; James V. Zucchi; Manah S.A. Comércio e Indústria Adubos e Rações; McFadden & Cia., Ltda.' Moinho Sta. Francisca S.A. Indústrias Gerais; Olin Mathieson Chemical Corp.; Pfizer Corporation do Brazil S.A.; Potash Export Association, Inc.; Produtos Guarany S.A.; Quimbrasil Química Industrial Brasileira S.A.; Refinações de Milho Brasil; Sanbra Sociedade Algodoeira do Nordeste Brasileira; Sigurd W. Schindler; Sociedade Brasileira de Participações e Financiamento Sofibraz; Stauffer Chemical Co.; Sulphur Institute; United Nations Techinol; Volkart Irmãos Ltda.  

³⁰  It was not until 1999-2000 that a significant breakthrough was made regarding fertility of the cerrados region.  Scientists at the University of California at San Diego discovered a gene that allowed plants to detoxify heavy metals such as the toxic soluble aluminum found in the cerrados soils.  These findings were reported in the 15 June 1999 issue of European Molecular Biology Organization Journal.    

³¹  For more on the development of the Venezuelan oil industry see Rómulo Betancourt, Venezuela's Oil (London: Allen & Unwin, 1978); Judith Ewell, Venezuela and the United States: From Monroe’s Hemisphere to Petroleum’s Empire (Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1996); John Lombardi, Venezuela: The Search For Order, The Dream of Progress  (New York: Oxford University Press, 1982); James Petras, Morris Morely, and Steven Smith, eds. The Nationalization of Venezuelan Oil (New York: Praeger Publishers, 1977); Stephen G. Rabe, The Road To OPEC: U.S. Relations With Venezuela, 1919-1976  (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1987); Laura Randall, Venezuelan Oil (New York: Praeger, 1987); Jorge Salazar-Carrillo, Oil And Development In Venezuela During The Twentieth Century (Westport, Conn.: Praeger, 1994); and Wayne Chatfield Taylor, The Creole Petroleum Corporation in Venezuela (New York: Arno Press, 1955).  

³²  Richard A. Haggerty, ed. "The Transition To Democratic Rule," Venezuela, A Country Study, (Washington, D.C.: Library of Congress, 1990) [February 2001]  <http://lcweb2.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/r?frd/cstdy:@field(DOCID+ve0000)>   

³³  After the return of civilian government in 1959 this became the National Agrarian Institute.  

³⁴  Dalrymple, 115.  

³⁵  Ibid, 102.  

³⁶  Ibid, 77.  

³⁷  "PIIP," Folder 98, Box 10, Series B, AIA-IBEC, RG 4, RAC.  

³⁸  Dalrymple, 140.  

³⁹  Heaton's knowledge of Venezuela's agriculture was captured in a 1967 publication entitled, Present Status and Possibilities of Agricultural Development in Venezuela.  This was published with assistance from the Ford Foundation and CBR.  

⁴⁰  Costa Rica received $1.6 million and Bolivia $3.5 million.  

⁴¹  Walter Crawford, Agriculture In Brazil, The Moods, The Reality And The Promise, 1960, Folder 58, Box 7, AIA, RG 4, RAC.  

⁴²  Berent Friele to John Camp, 10 Feb. 1961, Folder 59, Box 7, AIA, RG 4, RAC.  

⁴³  Northeast Brazil Survey Report, Feb. 1962, 16, Folder 62, Box 7, AIA, RG 4, RAC.  

⁴⁴  Crawford, Agriculture in Brazil.  

⁴⁵  A rural development project was eventually completed in the late 1960's at Jaíba under direction of the Brazilian state-controlled Rural Foundation. This organization reviewed and built on PIDR’s original plan.  

⁴⁶  Dalrymple, citing Papers of Robert W. Hudgens, Columbia Oral History Project.  

⁴⁷  Letter from Nelson Rockefeller to John D. Rockefeller Jr., 6 Sept. 1946, Series B, RG 4, RAC.  

⁴⁸  The Rockefeller Brothers Fund is a separate foundation set up in 1940 to coordinate the interests of the Abbey, John III, Nelson, Laurence, Winthrop and David Rockefeller.  

⁴⁹  Dalyrmple, 11; “AIA and the U.S. Balance of Payments Situation,” 8 Dec. 1967, Folder 251, Box 24, Series B, AIA-IBEC, RG 4, RAC; and “AIA Program Expenditures 1946-66,” Folder 251, Box 24, Series B, AIA-IBEC, RG 4, RF, RAC.  There is a discrepancy of $2.774 million between the monies raised and the monies allocated to the budget.  These funds were most likely either spent on a combination of personnel salaries and taxes.  

⁵⁰  Partners in Progress: A Report to President Truman by the International Development Advisory Board (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1951).    

⁵¹  Dalrymple, 187.  

⁵²  This label was given to Rockefeller by New York Times reporter Thomas Wicker while investing his career and background in 1975 prior during his Vice Presidential confirmation. Peter Collier and David Horowitz, The Rockefellers: An American Dynasty (New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1976).  

⁵³  One of the ideas proposed by these conferences was the concept of “open skies.”  This was radical and new proposal as it suggested that in order to prevent a surprise attack both the United States and USSR each provide one another with military establishment blueprints.  Walt W. Rostow, Open Skies (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1982).  For an analysis of Rockefeller's Cold War plan see Davis Merwin, “An Analysis Of The Rockefeller-Kissinger Report,” Marine Corps Gazette, 43:3 (1958), 20-31.  

⁵⁴  The list of experts included Dean Rusk, Roswell Gilpatric, Eugene Rostow, Paul Nitze, Chester Bowles, Philip Coombs, Harland Cleveland, Richard Gardner, Roger Hilsman, Lincoln Gordon, William Attwood, Adolf Berle, McGeorge Bundy, Walter Rostow, and Henry Kissinger.  For more see Rockefeller Brothers Fund, Prospect for America: the Rockefeller Panel Reports, (Garden City, N.Y., Doubleday, 1961).  

⁵⁵  Adlai E. Stevenson, The Alliance For Progress, A Road Map To New Achievements (Washington, D.C.: GPO, U.S. Dept. Of State, Inter-American Series, no. 72, 1961), 2; and Thomas C. Wright, Latin America in the Era of the Cuban Revolution (New York: Praeger, 1991), 72.  

⁵⁶  By most accounts, the Alliance for Progress was unsuccessful at providing the required level of funding or achieving the ambitious goals agreed to in 1961.  For more on how and why the plan failed see Jerome Levinson and Juan de Onis, The Alliance That Lost Its Way: A Critical Report on the Alliance for Progress (Chicago: Quadrangle Books, 1970) and Ronald L. Scheman, ed. The Alliance for Progress: A Retrospective (New York: Praeger, 1988).  

⁵⁷  Letter from John R. Camp to Nelson Rockefeller, 24 Feb.1961, 9, Folder 6, Box 1, John Camp Papers, Series I, RG 4, RAC.  

⁵⁸  Dalrymple, 115.