Context:

● The UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration addresses an urgent issue through uniting the world behind a common goal: preventing, halting, and reversing the degradation of ecosystems worldwide.

● Each and every one of us depend on healthy ecosystems, for our food, clean air and water as well as countless other ecosystem services. Biodiversity and its benefits underpin almost every aspect of human development and are key to the success of the SDGs. Although biodiversity is the infrastructure that supports all life on earth, we continue to threaten it with destructive consumption and production patterns.

● The current COVID-19 pandemic painfully reminds us that the harm we inflict upon nature has terrible consequences for the health of our global community.

● You may wonder why this concerns youth. Restoration is of particular importance to us, as we are the generation that has inherited the consequences of past wrongdoings. Therefore, youth globally have taken matters into their own hands sending a clear message that the planetary crisis needs to be addressed. Movements such as Fridays for Future and many others have demonstrated the youth’s ability to act as leaders and catalysts for positive change.

● Therefore, I am honored to be representing the voices of countless youth from UN Major Group for Children and Youth and from The Youth Cafe who are working hard towards the 2050 vision of “living in harmony with nature”

Problem:

● A key driver of ecosystem degradation and habitat loss is industrial agriculture and unsustainable management of crop and grazing land. Farmers increasingly specialize on a few or even single high-output varieties, resulting in excessive use of fertilizer, pesticides and tillage machinery, in turn entailing reduced soil quality and erosion.

● Responses to land degradation must, therefore, confront these challenges, and promote interventions that avoid, reduce and reverse land degradation, while at the same time ensuring food security of an ever-growing population.

How?

Good news :

● The good news is that such approaches and practices are well-known and at our disposal: agroecology, conservation measures, and integrated animal and crop production systems promote soil organic matter accumulation and nutrient cycling and enhance soil carbon storage. 

● Promoting such techniques is a necessity towards achieving the SDGs and the post-2020 global biodiversity targets.

● What this calls for is a profound paradigm shift from predominantly productivity-based approaches to one that recognizes the fundamental linkages between ecosystems and human health and acknowledges the critical value biodiversity has for our very existence.

● Youth can be a catalyst for transition and have demonstrated determination and energy to be agents of change. There is a growing amount of young people, who are eager to produce and consume food differently and are looking to start their farming business

● However, they are facing obstacles towards fully realizing their potential, amongst which 1. The struggle to access land 2. The challenge to define a viable and sustainable project that ensures good living conditions and income since many projects are not considered viable due to too small a surface area, too many products, or too much non-farming activity such as educational projects.

Innovative solution:

● To help newcomers, plenty of inspiring initiatives are flourishing around Africa

● One of them is the French civic organization Terre de Liens who assists young farmers in realizing their ambitions for an agroecological transition in farming

● They promote land preservation and facilitate access to farmland for organic farming and local farmers through community mobilisation, knowledge sharing, and direct land acquisition.

● Their structure is multi-facetted and made up of three components, including: 

1. Not-for-profit associations: On the national and regional level,

2. A private company limited by shares, which collects savings from the public and uses it to buy land and buildings, which are then rented out to farmers on long-term leases with environmental clauses

3. A Land Trust: which collects donations from individuals, companies and public authorities. Like the private company, it then rents the farms it has acquired to farmers.

● This structure allows Terre de Liens to guarantee to the selling owner that their farms will remain part of an ecological farming approach and enabled thousands of young farmers to access land. Most importantly, it shows that managing farmland as a commons and mobilizing ethical finance for sustainable agriculture is possible! What? Path to solution :

● Terre de liens and giving young people access to land for agroecological farming is just one example of how youth can add value to ecosystem restoration

● As a youth and a student, I know how determined my generation is, not just to raise awareness about the twin-crisis of biodiversity loss and climate change, but also to develop solutions and influence policy makers to address it.

● For instance, at The Youth Cafe we are currently leading a campaign with Earth Uprising to call for change within the African agricultural system by integrating agroecological solutions into the Common Agricultural Policy and the Farm to Fork Strategy.

Call to action:

● Lastly, besides local initiatives it is important that African institutions adopt measures to encourage young farmers to enter into sustainable agriculture. These include amongst others the creation of: incubators that help young farmers develop viable projects and access financing and platforms to share best practices among them and help build networks to upscale innovative farming businesses

● Ultimately, we youth are only part of the solution and need help of current policymakers to create an ecosystem that encourages and empowers us to disrupt the current dysfunctional system and replace it with a more sustainable and fairer one

Find more about the FAO webinar event. Learn more about our work on environmental conservation and contact us with any questions and inquiries .