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INDEX
1. - Contextualisation .................................................................................................................... 1 2. - Development........................................................................................................................... 2 3. - Conclusions .......................................................................................................................... 11 4. - Specific Proposals for Youth Issues ..................................................................................... 12 5. - Bibliographic References...................................................................................................... 14
1.- Contextualisation
Talking about young farmers, male and female, involves referring to a situation found throughout the world, although it encompasses a wide variety of cases. There is no typical young farmer model as this depends on their specific philosophy, the region where they live, the visibility they are given, etc. One common factor actually found in all regions is that young people represent a fundamental productive potential for economic and social development for rural communities and by extension for their society. Despite the fact that young people are strategic players in development, public policies have not actually paid them the necessary attention. Public policies aimed at young people require specific inter-disciplinary actions that focus on their problems, stretching beyond the field of farming.
Young farmers are the potential suppliers of the world's food; they play a fundamental role in preserving natural resources and maintaining land without forgetting that they represent an economic potential, essential in terms of reducing poverty. We are talking about an extremely important collective for global development that cannot be overlooked by national and international institutions. Political agendas should focus on making the most of their skills and strengthening them. Consequently, it is necessary to highlight the importance of supporting young farmers so they can develop their socio-economic skills, thereby driving development throughout society. Current trends in development are based on the possibility of establishing agreements by generating political dialogue scenarios between the State, through its governmental administration, and the different strata of society, mainly organisations representing Family Agriculture. As they are more familiar with technology and modern life, young people are more open to innovation and have a greater predisposition to association-based and supportive undertakings. Consequently, they should play a fundamental role by helping to develop programmes encouraging linking up and specific cooperation with a view to improving food safety and rural poverty. By summarising information in this document, we aim to provide an asset to be debated in depth during the Conference Work Groups. It will thereby identify key aspects allowing the agents involved to draw up their own specific requests and proposals to change the current situation of Young Farmers.
Chart 1. Rate of young people, out of total population by region. Data from 1991 to 2015.
According to CELADE (2005), the total estimated population of Latin America in 2010 was 589.7 million inhabitants, of which 121.2 million live in the countryside. Of them, 30.7 million were young people aged between 15 and 29. Looking at the total number of young people in the city and the country altogether, the rural population encompasses 26.5%. As far as gender groups are concerned, there is a clear predominance of men over women. Women represent only 47.4% of the rural population, demonstrating their greater migratory dynamic. This background must be taken into account when analysing migration and formation of couples in the countryside. In Southern Asia and sub-Saharan Africa, up to 70% of the young live in rural areas and half of the young population enters to the labour market through agricultural activities. Above all, subSaharan Africa is the region in which the young population is going to increment most quickly at global level (FIDA 2007, van der Geest 2010). In Europe, on the other hand, the agricultural sector is aging, a fact which weakens the capacity to meet nutritional and territorial challenges of the regions. According to data from the Annual Activities Report of CEJA, the European Board of Young Farmers, just 6% of the farmers of the European Union are aged below 35 (CEJA 2011). At global level, these rural youth and those who work in farming do not receive the necessary attention through the national and international development policies since most efforts are centered on urban youth (FIDA 2007).
According to population projections, the urbanization will gain ground in the future. Total growth of Latin American population in 2010 was 9.3%: the urban sector had grown by 11.5% and the countryside had dropped by -1.1%. In the case of young people, this trend seems very clear. If between 57.4% and 59.4% of young people in 1970 lived in cities, depending on their age, it is expected that in 2025, this proportion will lie between 81.9% and 84.5%, or in other words, by this year no more than 15% of young people will live in the rural area (Dirven 2000). Anyhow, it is evident that in general, rural youth tends to commute between rural and urban areas. Migrations towards the urban areas are going to augment, being this a survival strategy of young people faced with rural abandonment (Deshingkar 2004). For instance, in most parts of Asia and Africa, the remittances which are sent by urban migrants are exceeding income from agriculture (Bennell 2007).
This is a challenge and, at the same time, an opportunity for cooperation initiatives and public and private investment in development. It represents a challenge because young country people are also allies and partners in the task of improving and increasing the sustainability of current results and impacts of rural development policies. It also represents an opportunity, because young people depend on the fairest and most equal construction of a world in the present and the future (Rodriguez 2011).
Different youth forums have expressed that many young people wish to remain in the countryside but cannot manage this due to lack of resources and opportunities to develop life in the country, the economic situation and precarious social services (ILEIA 2004, Guaran de Castro 2009). There are a further two elements to take into account in this migratory decision, essential because they revolve around this desire for permanency: 1- Access to land in terms of being a right for rural villages, for anyone working, producing, looking after and living on the land. In this respect, regulation and "Land Ownership" is considered to be important for family farmers. 2- Agrarian Reform: implying, among other aspects, land redistribution, diversified production, taking care of the environment and preserving original cultures. Agrarian reform must promote remaining on the land, which must be guaranteed not only through legal security but also in terms of access to basic services. "The Full Agrarian Reform that we are planning is directly related to food safety and sovereignty for our villages; it is not only a political and ideological proposal, it constitutes a necessary measure to solve hunger, poverty and extreme poverty problems which the majority of the population are experiencing..." (International Conference on Integral Agrarian Reform 2006)
"Young people are the source of creativity, energy and initiative, of dynamism and social renewal. They learn fast and adapt easily. If they are given the chance to go to school and find work, they will contribute enormously to economic development and social progress. If we do not manage to give them these opportunities, in the best case scenario we will be condoning an unforgivable waste of human potential. In the worst case scenario, we will be contributing to all the evils of a youth without hope: demoralisation, and lives that are socially unproductive and potentially destructive, for the individuals themselves, the communities and even for the fragile democratic systems." (Annan 2000). The contribution from young people in the countryside to small family and non family businesses is extremely important as this is where there is the possibility of making a qualitative leap in types of production and commercialisation that make it easier to include medium and small sized production, starting by exploiting their advantages. In the small production units that in turn act as a learning context, young people emerge as the agent with the greatest potential for constantly adapting the production strategy. By means of equipping them with the right skills and technical resources, a young person in the countryside has the potential to make use of non traditional channels and sources of information, tending to improve the effectiveness of the farming processes. Potential to innovate traditional methods and procedures for cultivation. These characteristics are very important, not only in terms of adapting the productive process itself (handling agro-ecological conditions, diversification of activities, cyclical view of the productive process) but in terms of articulating this process to the national and international market conditions and the agrofood chains. Generational mediator of high technology transfer within the production unit and the social networks in which they participate. This would mean a "positive" intergenerational link that would overcome the conflictive view of power that makes the relationship problematic (Portilla 2000). One of the features making young people's incorporation into rural development programmes so valuable is their ability to successfully promote applying technology to improve agricultural production based on sustainable development. Experience has shown that young people are more open to new ideas and practices than adults, therefore all attempts to improve young people's skills, experiences and productive capabilities will have a positive impact and a better reception. Young people tend to create awareness and have a particular interest in the environment. They are often ready to validate and promote environmental practices. Young people have demonstrated that they are ready and willing to exert significant influence in this area. Rural youth programmes can become a catalyser strengthening environmental education, thereby contributing to food safety with sustainable development (Becerra 2001).
Rural education
Rural education is one of the fundamental pillars for equality, equal opportunities and for the growth of human beings. However, it is not currently appropriate in rural areas. Firstly, it is considered that it would be vitally important to extend the curriculum to include topics related to the countryside, as a way of avoiding uprooting and migration. Secondly, we have seen that it is necessary to guarantee access to this education. Finally, the multi-cultural aspect of rural education should be particularly considered, emphasising the culture of the original villages. Education is the main way of overcoming both poverty and the structural causes that reproduce it: low productivity in work, scarce access to the tools of modern life, socio-cultural marginality, greater vulnerability of families in terms of health, discontinuity and their children dropping out of education. Efforts and investments intended to increase achievements should be made to increment access to and quality of primary and secondary schooling. There are many challenges for education, particularly in terms of training young people for productive employment, active citizenship and participation in the knowledge society: problems of excessive repetition and dropping out of school, making it harder to make progress in achievements; problems of inequality in terms of opportunities and educational results, echoed in inequalities between one generation and the next; quality problems reflected in low levels of effective learning, limiting the careers and lives of young people and restricting society's human capital; vacuums that have to be filled regarding training for the knowledge society and contemporary democracies; and not adapting the role of education as preparation for new challenges in young people's world of educational work. Overcoming these challenges has a positive effect on reducing poverty and inequality (Durston 2000).
Young farmers must be aware of the implementation of agreements and regional decisions through a regional control platform that includes discussing water as public property, questions of natural wealth, respecting knowledge and rights for traditional villages, production and marketing of transgenic crops, vulnerability and adaptation to climate change, use of alternative energy sources, protection of ecosystems and control of desertification and respect for diversity of life. (Youth Leadership Summit Latin America 2005). In Asia and Africa, Junior Farmers' Field and Life Schools based on experiential learning are training young people in situation of exclusion such as orphans of HIV/AIDS on agricultural issues (management of soil, water, nutrients, etc.) (SARD 2007).
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Example in which a specific youth commitment led to a substantial improvement in development Within the context of MERCOSUR, the REAF (Specialised Meeting of Family Agriculture) takes care of differential policies for the region's Family Farming and highlights the contribution of political dialogue to designing public policies and their institutionalisation (Mrquez and Ramos 2010). The REAF Rural Youth Work Group has developed a set of regional initiatives aiming to build political dialogue scenarios among youth farming organisations and regional governments. One case involved setting up the Youth Training Course in Family Agriculture in 2008 and 2009 with the double aim of helping to train young farming managers whilst also creating an agenda of political priorities for young farmers, consolidated in the block's member countries. It is used as a programme and project development platform for young farmers.
3.- Conclusions.
Young people, essential for sustainable rural development
The elements highlighted in this document, taking the volume of rural youth as an example due to providing an important population segment and featuring greater skills and aptitudes to assimilate new concepts and technologies than the generations before them, turns young people's human capital into an essential factor for the sustainable development of rural areas, facilitating and strengthening the development of links or cooperation alliances between the three basic sectors of society: the state, civil society and the private sector (Becerra 2001). Consequently, it is necessary to build participation scenarios for political dialogue among the players involved in generating effective public policies for young family farmers. For this reason, the lines of action to be carried out in the area of rural youth must follow a territory management policy and must be guided towards encouraging this valuable human capital to remain in their original communities by means of incorporating these young people within the areas of economic, social, environmental and institutional development. One aspect to be considered is a public policy focus that must encompass young people in their dual dimension, on the one hand, as recipients of services that are offered by rural development
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programmes, taking into account their experiences, expectations and needs, in short taking young people as subjects of rights and at the same time, as strategic players in developing rural areas in favour of sustainability of Family Farming as a subsector of the agrofood and agroindustrial complex. As a conclusion we can be stated that young people in the countryside constitute strategic players for transforming rural lands and agents that can multiply registered capital. It is necessary to generate public policies for this sector's inclusion and participation to benefit political, social and economic development for rural areas. The World Bank 2008 report states that family farming is a more than an environmentally, economically and socially appropriate line for eradicating poverty in the world. Young people from the Countryside and particularly young farmers are going to play a fundamental role in achieving worldwide Food Safety and by extension in winning the fight against poverty. Their greater capability to adapt to changes, their sensitivity in terms of managing the territory and reducing negative impacts on the farming medium turns them into better prepared players favouring agriculture for development. It is important to identity the right means and tools so that young people can maintain their enthusiasm for the countryside. It is necessary to recognize their dedication and work. It is no longer possible to continue using old maps to travel down new paths. This means that we are building a new path because we want to attain a different target in the rural areas of our planet. It is time to change and turn a corner: "if we don't change direction, we'll end up back where we started".
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3. Lobbying decision-makers to include young people in actions intended to fight rural poverty and lack of food safety from all sectors, or in other words participating in governmental organisations, farming organisations, local institutions and forming part of productive transformations of their own rural communities by promoting environmental sustainability. 4. Promoting and supporting the creation of a strong national youth policy, with the aim of, on the one hand, resolving needs that make living conditions difficult for young people in rural communities, through differentiated education and skills strategies according to the communities' transition stage. On the other hand, with a strong national youth policy and the right financial funding, rural youth organisations have the potential to actively incorporate a large number of young people into development tasks. The measures related to them and other points will improve the opportunities and perspectives both for young people and for the worldwide community. Perhaps the key aspect lies in highlighting not so much what should be done for young people as what they might do if obstacles were eliminated and opportunities broadened. Young people can contribute decisively to achieving the proposed goals (Becerra 2001). Specific measures concerning policies for young people involved in Family Farming 1. Considerate rural youth as priority group in national and international policies. 2. Promoting of policies so as to develop rural areas and slow down and/or reduce the process of forced migration from the country to the city and rural depopulation; at the same time tackling the dreadful situations of poverty in rural life. 3. Making sure of the social function of the land, producing in accordance with its conservation and making sure of fair distribution of the income generated; favouring access to resources, paying particular attention to the use and distribution of the "land", recognising the social function and its close relationship with food sovereignty and land autonomy, embodied in national laws and rules. 4. Improving the quality of life for young people in aspects related to participating in the economy, emancipation of rights, education regarding values, gender equality, health, recreation, free time and leisure through programmes and special budgets. 5. Stimulating the organisation of new associative and cooperative companies to strengthen management capability, promote the young business focus locally, particularly in strategic steps of agrofood and agro-industrial chains. 6. Providing financial help, in the initial stages, for production and service projects for young people with technical and feasible planning, focussed on the market. 7. Improving human capital through formal and informal educational offer in the field adapted to the work available and potential work, with a programme of grants that equals out the access conditions for the different levels of training.
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8. Increasing the institutional aspect and opportunities to participate in the rural sector for young people and the intergenerational connection; favouring their auto-organisation and auto-representation. 9. Promoting sustainable production systems with agro-ecological focus and caring for the environment through programmes of training, innovation and intergenerational learning. 10. Building up a range of experiences and social, economic, educational and environmental indicators, specific for rural young people. Drawing up this range of empirical data tackles two important topics. On the one hand, the current lack of real and statistical information on young farmers will be resolved and, on the other, this information will help to identify the motives and/or reasons that push many young people to leave the rural world even when it offers good development opportunities. 11. Young women come up against greater difficulties than men in rural areas (access to employment, access to resources, education, salaries, etc.). This is why we have to look at the topic of gender transversally to guarantee access for young women in the countryside to the services generated by the rural development policies in order to reduce the so-called gender gap.
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DIRVEN, Martine. 2011. Rutas de aprendizaje Talentos Jvenes Rurales. Bogot. DURSTON, John. 1996. Estrategias de vida de los jvenes rurales, en CEPAL. Juventud Rural, Modernidad y Democracia. Santiago de Chile. DURSTON, John. 2000. Juventud rural y desarrollo en Amrica Latina. Estereotipos y realidades. CEPAL Divisin de Desarrollo Social. Santiago de Chile. DURSTON, John. 1998. Juventud y desarrollo rural: marco conceptual y contextual. CEPAL. Santiago de Chile. FONTENLA, Eduardo. 2010. Necesidad de una Poltica Pblica para jvenes del mbito rural. ESPNDOLA H., Daniel. 2002. Nuevo enfoque en polticas pblicas de juventud rural, Seminario Internacional La Revalorizacin de los grupos prioritarios en el medio rural, Mxico D.F., August 2002. GUARAN DE CASTRO, Elisa. 2009. Sistematizacin del Curso de Formacin de Jvenes Rurales de la REAF MERCOSUR. Convenio UFRJ-MDA. IFAD. 2007. Promoting livelihood opportunities for rural youth, knowledge and skills for development. IFAD. Rome. ILEIA. 2004. A new generation of farmers. En: LEISA Low Input Sustainable Agriculture. Vol. 20 N 2 2004. MRQUEZ, Susana; RAMOS, lvaro. 2010. Las polticas diferenciales para la Agricultura Familiar en el MERCOSUR. PORTILLA, Melania. 2003. Juventud Rural y Desarrollo Sostenible: Construyendo la Ciudadana de los Territorios Rurales. SINOPSIS No.3, IICA, March 2003. RODRGUEZ, Ernesto. 2002. Polticas de Juventud en Iberoamrica, insumos iniciales para el Libro Blanco. OIJ, Madrid. SARD. 2007. Children and youth. Sustainable Agriculture and Rural Development Policy Brief 8. FAO. Rome. UN. 2005. World youth report 2005. Young people today and in 2015. United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs. New York. UN. 2006. Guide to the implementation of the World Programme of Action for Youth. United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs. New York. UNDP. 2010. Informe Regional sobre Desarrollo Humano para Amrica Latina y el Caribe 2010. Actuando sobre el futuro. Romper la transmisin intergeneracional de la desigualdad. Programa de las Naciones Unidas para el Desarrollo. San Jos. VAN DER GEEST, Kees. 2010. Rural youth employment in developing countries. A global view. FAO. Rome. VERDIERE de, Arnaud. 2002. FAO RLC. Dicember 2002. WORLD BANK. 2007. World Development Report 2008: Agriculture for Development. World Bank. Washington D.C. WORLD BANK. 2006. World Development Report 2007. Development and the next generation. World Bank. Washington D.C.
Web sites:
FAO: Information page on rural youth, FAO http://www.fao.org/ruralyouth/inicio.htm
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Rural youth. REAF Mercosur. http://www.reafjoven.com.ar/ Population Reference Bureau, 2009. http://www.prb.org/Publications/Datasheets/2009/2009wpds.aspx REAF, Reunin Especializada de Agricultura Familiar. http://www.mda.gov.br/reaf.htm
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