Africa’s demographic dividend has tremendous potential to transform the supply and demand of future goods and services, including in the agriculture and food industry.

At its core, [the thematic working group] is a place to share lessons learned from both practitioners and donors. Putting us together in the same room helps us find solutions more easily.

[The GDPRD] has shown representativeness and inclusivity by giving us young people and entrepreneurs the opportunity to showcase our stories. By understanding our perspective, [donors] will be able to shape the products and funding models they present to us in the future.

Rural youth already have the solutions [...] together we can build the policies that the rural world and the climate crisis need.

When we look at the news, the world can seem overwhelming but my optimism is sustained by the youth themselves. I am reassured having met champions within governments and civil society organizations who are dedicated to the cause of youth well-being.

Meet Elisenda Estruch Puertas, Rural Economy Specialist at the International Labour Organization (ILO), and the new Co-Chair of the Platform’s Rural Youth Employment Thematic Working Group.

It is important to hear the voices of the youth themselves, in terms of what they want to happen if they are to be involved in the agricultural sector.

The agricultural sector must be transformed by ensuring that we develop value chains that create jobs in the agricultural system and by encouraging and supporting the continental programs for agriculture, such as CAADP, to ensure and enhance youth employment.

A reconfiguration of land ownership across the African Continent needs to be undertaken with ownership by the youth being prioritised.

We need to get more focused and engaged in decentralising our system of work and our system of policy-making, to ensure a bottom-up approach that develops policies which respond to the issues of youth.