Foreword

Youth are at the centre of a rapidly changing world. There are more youth today than at any other point in human history. If adequately nourished, educated, and equipped with the requisite resources, transparent information and opportunities to build up hopes and to access decent work, young people can drive economic transformation and global prosperity. The Status of Youth in Agrifood Systems report provides a timely and evidence-based assessment of how decent jobs and food security for youth can be achieved through agrifood systems transformation, and how empowered youth can act as catalysts for broader agrifood systems transformation. Youth need agrifood systems and agrifood systems need youth.

This report marks FAO’s first comprehensive evidence-based assessment of youth engagement in agrifood systems on a global scale. It explores the multiple dynamics that shape youth experiences in agrifood systems and derives actionable and policy-oriented recommendations based on programmes, initiatives, and regulatory measures that have worked in the past.

Agrifood systems employ 44 percent of working youth and remain a key entry point for youth employment, especially in low- and lower-middle income countries, where nearly 85 percent of the 1.3 billion global youth population resides. As agrifood systems transition, off-farm agrifood system employment becomes progressively more important for working youth compared to adults and this transition to employment outside agrifood systems occurs more quickly for young men than young women.

However, the distribution of rural youth and available opportunities varies with country’s stage of agrifood systems transition. Some regions are experiencing a bulging youth population, while others experience scarcity of youth in rural areas. The policy priorities for youth in these two contexts are distinct. Countries with large youth populations need policies to increase employment prospects and productivity. Low youth population contexts require policies that can attract youth to agrifood systems work and rural areas. The climate crisis adds another layer of complexity, with an estimated 395 million rural youth living in areas expected to experience declines in agricultural productivity potential, making agrifood system employment a less attractive livelihood option

Ensuring youth integration and benefits from agrifood systems requires deliberate efforts rooted in evidence-based policies and approaches that have proven successful on two fronts. First, expanding youth economic prospects by promoting inclusive productivity growth, accelerated transformation of agrifood food systems, and overall rural and structural transformation in ways that increase the supply of decent jobs, nutritious foods, and resilience to shocks and stresses. Second, empowering youth with agency, skills, and productive resources - including educational opportunities, land, finance, and digital technologies - to influence the agrifood systems transformation processes and partake in the outcomes. The potential payoff from such efforts is enormous: for instance, if all youth had access to decent jobs, the agrifood sector alone could add an estimated USD 670 billion to global GDP.

This report supports FAO’s commitment, under its Strategic Framework 2022-31, to prioritize youth as a cross-cutting theme across all of FAO’s work in transforming agrifood systems, and in fulfilling our aspiration of the Four Betters: better production, better nutrition, a better environment and a better life - leaving no one behind. FAO is unconditionally committed to stepping up its work with and for youth to ensure their voices are heard, and that their participation in and contribution to sustainable and inclusive agrifood systems are fully harnessed.

By joining forces as governments, the international development community, international organizations, private sector, civil society and of course youth themselves, we can Move Food Forward and build more efficient, inclusive, resilient, and sustainable agrifood systems for youth today, and for generations to come.

Dr QU Dongyu, FAO Director-General