youth

This magazine focuses on youth e-agriculture entrepreneurship. Young innovators in Africa, the Caribbean, and Pacific region, have recognized the need for creative solutions to raise agricultural productivity and the huge prospective market for their ICT-enabled services in agriculture. The issue includes articles with many examples and challenges of scaling-up initiatives and ensuring inclusive initiatives and on how to set up healthy, supportive eco-sytems for ICT start-ups in agriculture. It also offers practical advise on how young e-agriculture entrepreneurs can fund their initiatives and on how to develop a business strategy. »

In this blog, Grace Mwaura questions the nature of livelihood opportunities that young people are being encouraged to pursue and their implications for the future. She highlights three key issues around the narrative of enticing young people into agriculture: the ecological footprint, the markets, and the policy incentives. »

This report by IDS presents the results of a desk-based study to assess the available research evidence in relation to African young people’s engagement with agriculture, and to analyse how this evidence is reflected in current European Union (EU) policy and programming in Malawi, Ethiopia and Kenya, three of the 89 countries in which Alliance2015 members work. »

This study in the International Journal of Agricultural Extension examined the perception of rural youths toward Agriculture as a profession in Nigeria. Data for the study were obtained through interview and structured questionnaires administered to one hundred and twenty respondents. »

Farming and agriculture may not seem cool to young people, but if they can learn the thrill of nurturing plants to produce food, and are provided with their favourite apps and communications software on agriculture, food insecurity will not be an issue, food and agriculture experts said during the Asian Development Bank (ADB)’s Food Security Forum from June 22 to 24 at the ADB headquarters here. »

This blog on Takepart describes an interesting technological innovation serving smallholder farmers in Nigeria. For resource-poor farmers, labor shortages often leads to under-cultivation, poor harvests and lost income. Targeted farm mechanization has proven to be an effective solution to these shortages. Despite this, small farmers throughout Africa lack access to tractors to improve farm productivity. The company “Hello Tractor” has designed an innovative, low-cost “Smart Tractor” specifically for small farmers unique needs. »