By the Global AgroEcology Alliance (GAEA)
As we sat listening to the many speakers at the first Global Landscapes Forum (GLF) in Warsaw last year, we began to envision a future for ourselves in which we could be engaged professionally in tackling some of the complex, inter-dependent issues – those “wicked problems” – about which we heard so much. Although we were all freshly-minted Masters graduates in sustainable agricultural development, the introduction to the landscape approach afforded us a new and broader perspective on the meaning of – and pathways for – achieving sustainable development.
The messages from the GLF were clear. There is a pressing need to invest in the sustainability of all the interrelated facets of a landscape to develop sound policy options for their governance, and to work towards better comprehension of climate change mitigation, and adaptation, and the interaction of the two.
It wasn’t until weeks after the event, however, when we had once again scattered to our various corners of the globe, that we began to appreciate the full extent to which the GLF had inspired us. By drawing on and consolidating what we had learned at the forum, and combining this with our previous experiences, we enlisted some of our colleagues to the cause and came together online to launch a new platform, the Global AgroEcology Alliance (GAEA).
As we are all young professionals ourselves, our aim at GAEA is to reach out to other youth and young people around the world. We are working to encourage dialogue on sustainable agricultural systems and resource use and to organize research programs and development initiatives geared to improving the economic, environmental and social sustainability of land-use systems, rural livelihoods, and natural resource management.
Thus, against a backdrop of reports warning of aging farmer populations in the global north and an exodus of rural youth migrating to cities in the global south, GAEA has begun investigating the heavily contested topic of whether we are indeed facing a crisis in replacing the next generation of rural dweller and farmers. Given the host of drivers potentially pushing youth away from the land (such as poor rural infrastructure, land degradation and the lack of lucrative economic opportunities), and given that the significance of any given driver is likely to vary by locality and that these drivers are deeply entrenched in the political, economic, environmental and social contexts at household, regional, national and global scales, we recognize that the approach needed for this inquiry must reflect this complexity, while also examining a staggering number of factors.
In light of all this and given our resource limitations we have chosen as a first step to organize this initiative as a series of case studies to be conducted simultaneously across several countries and multiple continents. The studies are designed to examine the youth attitudes towards farming careers and to characterize the many factors pushing and pulling youth into and out of agriculture around the world. Only by understanding these factors can we determine whether current trends are likely to continue, what we as a society risk if they do, and what more must be done to ensure that the next generation has the tools and incentives to find financial reward and personal fulfillment as “sustainable landscape managers”.
Moving forward, we are planning two additional initiatives that aim to translate the knowledge gained through these studies into concrete action. First, we intend to use the information gained in the case studies to guide the development of curriculum material that will be openly available for teachers, farmers and volunteers to use in schools and educate youth about farming and food systems in different landscapes, which will also be coupled with a video project. With this, we hope to make our own small contribution to breaking down barriers and beginning to re-engage youth with the land and with sustainable and diverse food production, while highlighting the opportunities for sustainable development.
Secondly, we plan to engage our broader network of professional contacts in an expanded platform, leveraging our capacity for remote collaboration and our diverse skill sets, experiences and backgrounds to bring a landscapes approach to small-scale agricultural development projects around the world. By organizing ourselves and working together, we can offer our cumulative knowledge and resources to helping ambitious farmers and landscape managers almost anywhere on earth to realize their aspirations of prosperity and sustainability, one modest project at a time.
We believe that by pooling the dedication and ideas from a diverse group of young people, GAEA provides a promising platform for diverse stakeholders to work together and construct innovative avenues for shaping more sustainable global agricultural landscapes for the future. With these efforts, we hope above all else to also inspire our peers around the world to keep asking difficult questions, approaching intractable problems and seeking new, innovative solutions to those “wicked problems” that our landscapes entail.
Want to learn more about GAEA? Contact: info@gaealliance.org
