Focus on attracting youth to agriculture

Capture the interest of young people in agriculture from early and keep them interested through the use of new technologies.

These were the main points panellists of the 13th FAO and CARICOM Secretariat’s regional COVID-19 webinar entitled “Private Sector Investment in Agriculture and Fisheries: The Preparation and the Pay-Off” expressed when questioned on what path was necessary to get youth involved in the sector.

Jose Apulche, CEO of the Ministry of Agriculture in Belize, highlighted that after going “back to the drawing board” with youth engagement, his country was looking at getting young people involved in non-traditional agricultural areas. 

“What we have decided to focus on is to reintroduce agriculture at the primary school level through covered structure, protected gardening et cetera, usually complementing school feeding programs so that out of that captive audience within the school environment, we can indeed attract new farmers with a business mindset to a large extent,” he stated.

He highlighted while it was not yet included as a core part of the curriculum, such farming was being used as training ground for science, mathematics and even basic business.

“I think that this is absolutely key, because if we wait too long to capture the mind of the youths they will be engaged in other things that distract them away from agriculture. That  has been our experience,” he said, adding “We also recognise our youth in awards with ‘Youth Farmer of the Year’ and ‘Female Farmers of the Year’ and others, because we try to diversify the base and open up both the business opportunities, but also the recognition at all levels, but I would want to think that by introducing a wider audience through the primary schools would be the best way to collect new farmers.”

Ralph Birkhoff, CEO of Alquimi Renewables in Anguilla expressed similar sentiments and said youth would be driven into agriculture through the use of technologies and greenhouse systems.

“Young people love new technology so if you are creating clean lab environment where you are growing using state of the art systems, we can drive that interest back and also certify them at a higher level of technical training so if they want to work somewhere else in the world they would have that ability as well,” Birkhoff explained. (JMB)