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January 14th, 2016

The future of youth in agricultural value chains in Ethiopia and Kenya

Published by Fair & Sustainable, Wageningen University, AgriProFocus,

This report (PDF) from Fair & Sustainable and AgriProFocus elaborates on how increased youth involvement in the agricultural value chain can improve food security and diminish youth unemployment. The study assesses where in the farming systems and the agricultural value chain youth is present and tries to understand the perspectives of youth towards agriculture. The study identifies the conditions that influence the involvement of male and female youth in maize and potato value chains in Ethiopia and Kenya. The authors conclude that organisations need to look beyond statistics to determine who ‘the youth’ really are in the context of their society. The authors argue that in general low income, limited availability of land and finance, lack of education and training, negative perceptions, inadequate infrastructure and market access cause youth not to be involved in the agricultural sector. Therefore the authors believe that to include youth in agriculture, efforts need to be aimed at these topics. However, the local context and the inter-relatedness of different topics needs to be taken into account. The authors also created a ‘dashboard’ that shows the six conditions, and gives indicators for each of these conditions. When the dashboard is filled in, it gives the practitioner an overview in one page on which conditions score well, and which ones need improvement. Based on this mapping, organisations, governments and others, can start looking for domains of intervention.

Curated from fairandsustainable.nl