Webinar: Climate resilience and job prospects for young people in agriculture

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Photo credit: C. Schubert

Climate change matters for all people. Does it matter particularly for young people? If so, where and how?

Countries with a high proportion of young job seekers (for example, those projected in 2030 to have 15% or more of their populations in the age group between 15 and 24 years old) are on average more dependent on agriculture than are countries with more mature population profiles. Regions with many rural young people (South Asia) and rapidly growing numbers (Africa south of the Sahara) are likely to remain reliant on agriculture in the coming decades. Of the projected slightly more than 500 million rural young people globally in 2030, two-thirds will be in Africa south of the Sahara and South Asia. In many African countries farming still employs over half of a rapidly growing labor force, and the absolute number of agricultural workers is still rising. Where agriculture is called upon to deliver job security as well as food security, vulnerability to climate change presents major risk. The risk falls disproportionately on young people because it will affect their job prospects in agri-food systems. How can we envisage the impact of climate change on livelihood opportunities for young people, and what can be done to improve their prospects?

Presenters 
Karen Brooks is Adjunct Professor, Global Human Development, at Georgetown University. Dr. Brooks served as Director of the CGIAR Research Program on Policies, Institutions, and Markets, led by IFPRI, from July 2012 to August 2018. Prior to joining the International Food Policy Research Institute in 2012, she worked for many years on the agricultural programs of the World Bank, with emphasis on Africa South of the Sahara and the agricultural transition from central planning in Eastern Europe and Central Asia. She has also taught in the Department of Applied Economics at the University of Minnesota. Karen holds an undergraduate degree in Political Science from Stanford University, and a PhD in economics from The University of Chicago. She has published on issues related to agricultural policy in centrally planned economies, price and land policy in countries transitioning from planned to market economies, and the challenges of youth employment in Africa south of the Sahara.

Keith Wiebe is Senior Research Fellow at the International Food Policy Research Institute in Washington DC, where he leads a research program on Global Futures and Strategic Foresight. Prior to joining IFPRI in October 2013, he was Deputy Director of the Agricultural Development Economics Division of the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization in Rome, where he managed a program of economic research and policy analysis for food security and sustainable development, and helped coordinate preparation of FAO’s annual flagship reports on the State of Food and Agriculture and the State of Food Insecurity in the World. Previously he was Deputy Director of the Resource and Rural Economics Division of the US Department of Agriculture’s Economic Research Service in Washington, DC. He received his B.A. in economics from Carleton College, and his M.A. and Ph.D. in agricultural economics from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. His areas of particular interest include land tenure, natural resource use and conservation, agricultural productivity and food security.

Recording of the webinar, podcast, and the presentation will be available at the webinar page soon after the event.