Remy N. Bargout and Dawn Cordeiro are from The University of Guelph. Mitalie Makhani is from the University of Toronto. Gonee Saini is from the University of British Columbia.
It is interesting to consider parallels between two pressing international topics: 1) a growing need to strengthen global food security, and; 2) an unprecedented youth bulge, offering the potential of a demographic dividend. Furthermore, it is interesting to consider this demographic dividend from a rural perspective, and what implications this might have for global food security. Some of the people left most vulnerable to the dangers of food insecurity are the 1.2 billion youth between the ages of 15 and 24. Simultaneously, there is ongoing discussion that youth have an important role to play in strengthening global food security [1, 2]. Indeed, it is worth considering how such a global demographic dividend relates to global food security.
We have witnessed how improvements in child mortality and life expectancy can occur rapidly, and that reduced fertility rates are an often-subsequent occurrence in a country’s development process. The delayed drop in fertility creates a population boom, or a generational ‘bulge’ in the population. This population bulge is typically a burden on society and increases the dependency ratio, until a window of opportunity opens during the demographic shift out of adolescence, and into the productive labour force as adults [3, 4]. For countries with healthy markets, strong economic growth, and effective government policies, the demographic shift represents an opportunity to successfully capitalize on the working potential of this population bulge [3]. This opportunity is know as a demographic dividend.
The majority of the world’s youth, about 85% [5], live in the developing world, where they make up on average about 20% of any given country’s population [6]. This is the largest generation of young people in human history. Equally as important to remember, most of these young people still live in rural areas. However, globalization is almost ubiquitously transforming the lives of young people, without exception in even the most isolated communities [7]. We are now seeing an explosive trend of rural to urban migration. In other words, there is a global trend by which fewer and fewer people are choosing to live in rural areas.
What is more, fewer and fewer people, particularly young people, are choosing to be directly involved in food production. Do not forget that history has proven, throughout the development process of any country, it is common for there to be a significant decline in the proportion of the population directly involved in agriculture. The only major difference is the rate this transition occurs. The rate of withdrawal from agriculture is based on the strength of various push and pull factors. These are factors that, simultaneously, pull people into more lucrative labour markets associated with secondary and tertiary industries of urban centres, and push people out of less lucrative primary labour markets associated with agrarian rural areas [8-10]. However, before looking at the diverse push-pull factors causing youth to be disinterested in agricultural livelihoods, we should first consider the diversity of youth themselves.
Youth should not be viewed as a homogenous demographic group, as there are many socio-economic variables as to what might constitute a young person [1]. We might look at cross-cultural definitions of youth. We might look at age, using the United Nations definition of 15 to 24. Still, we would be more justified in using a somewhat universally accepted social definition, in that youth are those persons experiencing a transitional period of life. They are transitioning from adolescence to adulthood; from financial dependence to financial independence [3, 6, 11, 12].
During this transition, therefore, why is it that the world’s large populations of rural youth do not perceive agriculture to be an economically viable livelihood for them to secure their financial independence? The answer, in simple terms, is that agricultural is not an economically viable livelihood. In fact, agriculture in many poor countries – often characterized by small-scale rainfed farming – is riddled with high-levels of risk and unprofitability. Some of the key macro issues related to agriculture in global south are 1) high levels of risk and typically low return on investment, 2) tarnished image of professional farming, 3) poor access to land, 4) poor access to credit, 5) technological backwardness, 6) heavy manual labour requirement, and 7) the prevalence of debt among small farm households.
Worldwide, youth are three times more likely to be unemployed than adults, and there is an estimated 300 million youth who are part of the global working poor. [10, 13]. Working poverty is defined by someone who is employed, but lives in a household where each person is living on less than $USD 1.25 per day. Even still, for those earning less than $USD 2 per day, there are four times as many working poor youth as there are unemployed youth, and they typically work in rural areas [13]. Therefore, we can say that both unemployment and working poverty are more prevalent among young people than adults and, perhaps, even more prevalent among youth in rural areas [14]. In 2011, the United Nations World Youth Report estimated that working youth make up 24% of the world’s working poverty and, what is most crucial, is that the majority of global working poverty occurs in agricultural sectors. [5]
The question, therefore, is how can we empower farmers in poor countries, and how can we modernize the manner in which they produce food? Only then will there be a possibility of seeing more young people desire to be farmers and take part in strengthening global food security. Renowned scientist and father of the Green Revolution in India, M.S. Swaminathan, has often described how young people will only be attracted to careers in farming if agriculture becomes economically rewarding and intellectually stimulating [15]. In December 2011, the president of the International Fund for Agricultural Development described how feeding the world is one of our greatest challenges, and also one of our greatest opportunities. Acknowledging that world population is estimate to reach 9 billion by 2050, and that food production will need to increase by more than 70 per cent, he stated how its is more important than ever to create opportunities for young people in rural areas, particularly in the area of food production [6].
One of the solutions to combating hunger and malnutrition, and to meet global food demand, is to foster a rural environment that encourages and enables young men and women to stay in their communities. If nothing else, rural youth deserve the opportunity to make decent livelihoods for themselves. As future food producers, rural youth deserve the opportunity to pursue prosperity and obtain dignified and legitimate jobs in agricultural sectors [6]. After all, the 16th target of the Millennium Development Goals is to develop and implement strategies for decent and productive work for youth [10] We side line rural youth. Advocating and prioritizing the needs of rural youth is not an option for governments and international organizations; it is an obligation. Indeed, for some time now, the international community has understood how agricultural sectors have some of the greatest potential for improving youth employment in developing countries. However, there are great obstacles to realizing this potential. We have yet to harness the agricultural potential of the world’s demographic dividend for the benefit of global security [10].
Globally there is a high amount of risk associated with farming livelihoods. How do we reduce this risk in the face of spiraling population pressures, increasing climate volatility, and growing uncertainty in commodity markets? Globally, the demonstrable majority of young poor working people, making less than $1.25 per day, are employed in the rural agricultural sectors. The majority of young working people earning above $2 per day are employed in the world’s industrial and service related sectors[13]. There are unavoidable pull factors attracting youth away from agriculture, as a result of globalization, urbanization, and diversifying labour markets. Therefore, we might look at how to reduce the push factors. Governments and NGOs cannot necessarily make the high paying tertiary and secondary jobs found in metropolitan centres any less attractive to young people. However, relative to these more lucrative non-agricultural jobs, there is at least something that the public sector can do to make agricultural jobs less financially precarious and, as such, relatively less un-attractive to rural youth.
For the time being, there still remains an extremely large demographic dividend of rural youth in developing countries. Rural youth who want legitimate jobs. Rural youth who want dignified jobs. To help these young people maintain and improve global food security, governments of developing countries, and respective international organizations, must advocate that with successful economic growth – and subsequent improvements in development, indicated by rapid rural to urban migration – there must be significant investments in agriculture.
There must be significant investments in agriculture to make the profession of farming economically viable and financially secure. There must be significant investments in agriculture to streamline and modernize the profession of farming. There must be significant investments in agriculture so that we can ensure the vast population of job-seeking young people has a future in being successful farmers. This is so that young people can have a dignified and legitimate purpose in improving global food security. This is so that the future generation of food producers can confidently ensure our cities have food by the year 2050.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
The authorship of this article is in thanks to necessary partnerships with the Canadian International Development Agency, Shastri Indo-Canadian Institute and M.S. Swaminathan Research Foundation.
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