Submitted by Stephen Kibet. Stephen Kibet was one of our inspiring Young Speakers at the Global Landscapes Forum’s youth session in Warsaw 2013.
Ahead of the youth activities at December’s Global Landscapes Forum (GLF) in Peru, which will focus on building youth skills and knowledge to become leaders and effectively contribute to discussions, we caught up with Stephen to find out how his career path has changed and his advice for upcoming youth leaders and participants in the 2014 GLF (Register to attend the youth session here).
- Where were you with your career before the Global Landscapes Forum youth session in 2013? What’s changed the most for you in the last 12 months? What projects are you currently working on?
The GLF was an eye opener on landscape issues, conservation, policies – but also on what role the youth can play. My passion for natural resource management, and my slight shift from GIS to Land Management and Conservation is relatively recent. After the GLF, I decided to re-start my studies in this new specialty (Land Management and Conservation) in the Netherlands; I am starting just now.
2. What was the most concrete benefit or opportunity you gained by participating in the Global Landscapes Forum youth session in 2013?
I benefitted mostly through the interaction with the other young speakers. For example, I could see, through my discussions with Otim Joseph, how we could integrate tree planting and mapping, and we could encourage young people to do so too. Before, I was only identifying disaggregated lands through mapping; now I have moved a step further with sensitizing young people in planting trees.
3. What do you think was one of the most important moments for youth engagement in climate change, land use or sustainable development and what should we learn from this?
Youth contributions which bring concrete ideas and examples about experiences on how young people are active in environmental and agricultural matters are fundamental to me. Remember Joseph Macharia and his Facebook initiative. From this we should learn to give youth the voice they deserve. Even more, the projects youth implement are low cost projects and often inspired by what we have learnt from each other. Young people have time to get involved in significant actions; they can challenge policies and they can contribute in projects in the field.
4. Do you have any advice for the youth leaders and participants in the upcoming youth session in Peru? (this could be related to their participation, career advice that you have received etc).
Let us sit down and discuss our issues; let’s focus on how we can implement solutions concretely. Let’s make sure that for each issue we identify a concrete solution that can be implemented by us without necessarily needing anyone else. The solutions must be cost effective and span different geographic areas and specialties.
This belongs to a blog series profiling youth leadership in landscapes. Tell us your youth story – submit blogs to landscapes.youth@gmail.com
