For those of us who have tried to plant vegetables in our gardens, it is clear that what at first seems easy often turns out to be an arduous task. In just a few days, the young fresh vegetables you’ve planted are infested with many species of insects, pests and birds.

How does this work for those whose job it is? Let’s compare what happens in the fields and in greenhouses.

Field farming

Field cultivation is the traditional method of farming. To be successful, the soil must be rich in nutrients, free of disease, have a balanced pH and be of good composition. Environmental risk management is paramount to achieve the highest probability of success. Generous applications of pesticides, insecticides, fungicides and herbicides are often necessary to keep plants alive. We often hesitate to buy pesticides for our garden because we know the impact they can have on our health and the environment, but we don’t necessarily think about it when we buy vegetables at the market or order a salad from a restaurant.

Greenhouses

Greenhouses allow you to control the environment in which your crops grow. Not only do they protect against insects and birds, but they also allow you to better control temperature, humidity, irrigation and light. You can create the right conditions for your plants to thrive, without using harmful pesticides, to ensure the sanitary quality of your vegetables. If you are considering becoming a commercial grower, by using a greenhouse, you can actually predict the expected yield and analyze the variables of plant growth.

And of course, growing fruits and vegetables in a greenhouse doesn’t mean that your garden should look like the Almeria desert with its endless landscapes of plastic greenhouses. No! You can create a small greenhouse and make your tarpaulin from polyethylene obtained from sugar cane crops.

On 4th June 2020, our member organisation APSD-Agenda 21 from Romania organised the third local visit planned among the activities of MIJARC Europe’s annual work plan “Rock, Paper, Participation“. The work plan focuses on seeing-judging-acting on how young people get involved in the dialogue on agricultural policies and on how they take part to sustainable agricultural practices.

The Rock, paper, participation” annual work plan is co-funded by the European Youth Foundation of the Council of Europe and the European Union.

Following the introduction of the lockdown measures of the COVID-19 pandemic across almost all European countries, several of MIJARC Europe’s member organisations decided to organise the local visits as national webinars. The team of MIJARC Europe designed a webinar format based on online tools and assisted the member organisation in implementing their activities online in line with the objective of the work plan. APSD-Agenda 21 was the first member organisation that hosted a national webinar instead of a local visit to a farm, but the event was useful, effective and well received by the participants.

Organising the event online as a webinar gave the advantage of having more than 12 participants and making it a national rather than a local event. APSD-Agenda 21 spread the call in its national network and finally 66 participants from five counties in Romania attended the webinar.

The webinar was led on Zoom and included a balanced mix of theoretical input and practical exercises that made the activity dynamic and interesting for the participants. First, they got the chance to know each other better through a set of four questions that invited them raise there hand if during the lockdown period that had:

  • taken part to a challenge on social media
  • listened to a podcast
  • baked something for the first time
  • attended online meetings while still wearing their pyjamas

The next block on the agenda was dedicated to agriculture and aimed at bringing the young participants closer to agricultural practices and to understanding how agriculture is done in their country and in Europe. Based on the study on youth involvement in agriculture that MIJARC Europe published specially for this visit, the participants found out that:

  • 56% of the EU citizens live in rural areas;
  • there are almost 12 million farmers in the EU, with only 29% of the farmer owners being women and only 5% being young than 35 years old;
  • Romania is the largest producer of sunflower in the EU;
  • 33% of Romania’s active population work in the agricultural sector.

After the general introduction to the topic of agriculture, the participants had the chance to discuss with one of the leading experts on agriculture in Romania, Mr. Vînătoru Costel – head of the plant gene bank in Buzau and horticulture engineer at the Plant Research and Development Station in Buzau-Romania. The discussion focused on practices used in sustainable agriculture, the phases a product goes through from the moment it is just a seed to the moment we can consume it, several projects of the research station, the expert personal motivation to study agricultural and work in the field, the Common Agricultural policy and who implements it in Romania, ways to involve young people in agriculture and the main problems farmers face in Romania.

The second part of the meeting focused on youth involvement in policies and especially in agricultural policies. While the participants had some idea about what a policy is, almost none of them had ever been involved in a structured dialogue process ir was aware of how young people could influence a policy.

Next, the participants explored the Common Agricultural Policy and the way it is implemented in Romania and were introduced to the Revised European Charter on the Participation of Young People in Local and Regional Life (the Charter) They went through the six-step implementation model, the principles of the Charter, the ladder of participation and the RMSOS approach and were very pleased to see that there was an instrument that could guide them towards getting involved in policies at local and regional level.

Revised Charter

The evaluation session revealed the fact that the participants found the webinar very useful and interesting and discovered a multitude of tools they could use to get involved.

The three specialized work commissions created by MIJARC Europe back in 2017 started their work on the three thematic focus points and for the past year have had an increasingly more important role in the structure of MIJARC Europe.

The three commissions work on:

1. A sustainable culture for agriculture and rural youth
2. Our European vision towards an interconnected world
3. Citizenship and youth participation in rural development

We are currently launching a new call for members of the commissions to fill in the empty seats and join the other commissioners in their work.

IT’S TIME TO START YOUR MANDATE AS A MEMBER OF ONE OF OUR THREE COMMISSIONS,

SO JOIN US NOW!


What you will have to do:

  1. attend at  least  one  Commission  meeting  per   All travel, accommodation and meal costs will be covered by MIJARC Europe;
  2. attend the online meetings (via Skype; the number of meetings will be agreed by the members of each Commission);
  3. work on and take decisions about the methods to use and how to deal with the topics that are linked to the Action Plan;
  4. support the European Team as experts, ensure the external representation of the organization and set up the Think Tank if needed;
  5. set up and run the European campaigns as written in the Action Plan  of MIJARC Europe.

How to become a member of the Commissions:

Fill in the application form here below and send it to the Secretariat of MIJARC Europe via email: office-europe@mijarc.info

The ideal candidate is expected to:

  • Have a good understanding of MIJARC Europe, its structure and its aims;
  • Be aware of the rural realities in his/her country (and preferably beyond) and be familiar with the perspectives of rural youth;
  • Be interested in one of the three thematic focus points and be ready to do more research;
  • Be able to support young participants in their learning process;
  • Be able to communicate in English;
  • Be able to work in a multicultural team;

Be available for at least one international meeting per year;

Application form

“He leaves his city job to become a market gardener”, “In Italy young people are returning to agriculture”, “Goat rearing, a popular activity for young people undergoing vocational retraining”… You’re bound to come across these kinds of titles in the media as they’re becoming more and more common. 

What motivates Europe’s youth, both rural and urban, to turn to agriculture? And above all, why is it actually good news?

Agriculture in need of youth

When studying the agricultural situation in each of the EU countries, two observations stand out: the agricultural population is ageing (in 2016, 60% of farmers were aged 55 or over) and the number of farms is declining prodigiously (a reduction of a quarter of farms between 2005 and 2016). In France, the Ministry of Agriculture has even announced that by 2026, 45% of French farmers will have retired.

Under these conditions, aid for the installation of young farmers has become a priority for the European Commission in the negotiations for the CAP, which will come into force in 2022. The future CAP includes provisions such as raising the ceiling for installation aid from EUR 70,000 to EUR 100,000. Income support, but also measures facilitating access to land and land transfers are among the main instruments to help young farmers.

Agricultural settlement as vocational retraining for young people

Yet, despite this rather dark picture we are painting, and despite the urbanization that frames the landscapes, we observe a growing return of young people to the land. Many are returning to rural areas, and many are also leaving their jobs to work in agriculture.

It is easy to draw up a typical profile of these young people: often around 30 years old, over-qualified, they have been working for a few years in an office job in which they do not flourish. Many of them are aware of the uselessness of the tasks entrusted to them in the context of their work (often in fields such as marketing or finance, among others). This is a phenomenon that anthropologist David Graeber describes perfectly in his essay Bullshit jobs: a theory, published in 2018.

Why should we encourage them?

This kind of conversion to farming, by young people with little or no experience in farming, sometimes annoys farmers. It is an understandable reaction: working the land, in all its science and complexity and especially its hard work, cannot be a playful activity to which one turns when tired of “city” jobs, thinking that it will only be a matter of breathing more fresh air and swapping one’s office for open spaces.

However, we would be wise not to make fun of these young people in retraining too quickly. While it is easy to point the finger at the ‘trendy’ aspect of this kind of retraining, it is way less easy to make the decision to abandon a comfortable lifestyle with a guaranteed salary and turn to farming, which, let’s be honest, is no longer an attractive job today.

It would be rather caricatural to paint a portrait of these young people as city dwellers in search of “connection with nature”, unaware of the difficulty of the work that awaits them. They are actually often fully aware of this, but they are driven by something much stronger: the desire to participate in this gigantic effort to feed the population. Above all, they belong to this new generation which carries ideals: a sustainable agriculture that would be more respectful of the environment and the health of farm workers and consumers, a willingness to innovate, to produce locally etc.

So as rural inhabitants, and even as farmers, let us encourage, support and guide them. We should help them in their learning and when they face the first difficulties, because these young people represent an unexpected succession at a time when agriculture is so much in need of support.

What are superfoods?

Super foods generally refer to foods that are particularly rich in nutrients, especially fruits and vegetables. Super foods are therefore often full of vitamins, minerals and antioxidants, which can have beneficial effects on health. Most super foods are plant-based foods that naturally have high levels of individual micronutrients, enzymes and secondary plant substances.

Why don’t we enjoy them as we should?

Fresh super berries, cereals or leaves are usually rich in valuable ingredients to begin with, but the journey from growing areas in exotic countries to our supermarket is a long one. The products are often harvested too early, sometimes heavily processed to make them edible, or are stored in shipping containers for weeks on end. This raises the question of how much of the advertised benefits actually reaches the consumer and benefits his or her health.

Grow your own superfoods!

Growing one’s own superfoods gives certainty about the ingredients they contain and is also more environmentally friendly by saving a large amount of transport CO2 emissions.
Berries that contain many antioxidants are perfect examples of superfoods. Of course, it is not easy to keep a large raspberry bush on the balcony, but there are smaller plants with just as much benefits! For example, spinach is a natural appetite suppressant, broccoli contains anti-inflammatory substances and pumpkin seeds are good for our magnesium needs.

So… Will you join us in planting your own food? 

The European Union, a peace project

Europe is not a recent construction. It has existed for centuries, as a continent but also as a community, with a shared historical and cultural heritage. And yet, in 1950, Robert Schuman declared “A united Europe was not achieved, and we had war”. Indeed, Europe had just been devastated by the Second World War and experienced its worst trauma, barely 20 years after a war so atrocious that European nations swore it would be their last. So as not to mince words, the heads of state of Western Europe understood this time that the construction of a political Europe was the condition for lasting peace.

The European project is therefore first and foremost a peace project. From the creation of the ECSC in 1950, bringing together countries that were at war with each other five years earlier, to the Europe of 27 that our nations form today, we have come a long way.

The duty of young people in maintaining this peace

Yet, while it is true that within the borders of the EU, peace has been established between nations, European states have repeatedly been at war with other regions of the world (Syria, Mali, Afghanistan, etc.) for the past 20 years.
Far from fantasizing about a global and fulfilled peace, European youth, although aware of the limits of the EU, nevertheless places its trust and hopes in it. Young European people are conscious of the task that lies ahead of it: to work, through solidarity, exchanges and the duty of remembrance, towards a long-lasting peace.

MIJARC Europe focuses its work on young people in rural areas and agriculture and by this establishes a link between young people from all over Europe to serve this objective.

After the World War II Catholic Rural Youth Movements felt the necessity to get in contact with rural youth coming from other countries and to build up an international understanding. Building up a world with social and economic justice was one reason why the movements of Flanders – Wallonia (Belgium), France, Netherlands, Luxembourg, Italy, Germany, Portugal, Switzerland and Austria came together and established an international Catholic movement for rural and agricultural youth during the 50’s.

MIJARC Europe’s action helps European young people to bound 

On this Europe Day, the day after the 8 May commemorations marking the end of the Second World War, it is important to also reflect on our roots and the reasons why networks like MIJARC were created. We should never forget to keep up this essential part of our work, to bring people from different countries together and raise our voices against injustice and to be part of the European peace project.

We are writing these words when only 5 days ago we were all gathered online for a giant skype, playing and laughing together from our houses. Even isolated as we are these days, the bonds we have built up between us do not come apart and break down the walls of our homes and the borders of our countries.

A testimony from a young peasant from France

 

Ten days ago was the International Peasants’ Rights Day, an occasion that MIJARC Europe took with ECVC to pay tribute to the peasants and to remind them why we are proud to support them.

But supporting farmers is not an action that needs a particular day in the year, especially as the theme of the year at MIJARC Europe is agriculture!

MIJARC Europe works for and with rural youth. So, in order to bring its own contribution, MIJARC decided to give a voice to young peasants and ask them to give us the reasons of their pride.

Here is the testimony of Louis, a 30 years old French winegrower:

“I’m proud to be a young peasant because…

I am proud to cultivate land in a sustainable way in order to maintain its agronomic potential for future generations. I am proud to have a systemic approach to the vine crop I grow. I am proud to use alternative pest control products with a view to respect the environment.

Being a peasant is being proud to generate an income from agriculture and to be able to provide work for others through our products. Being a young peasant also means not forgetting what others have done before you and respecting it.  It also means knowing how to move a production system forward.

Being a young peasant also means being proud to communicate about your profession, taking into account the social aspect of your professional environment. It also means being proud to produce healthy products that are accessible to the greatest number of people.”

 

You are also a young peasant, and proud to be one? We would be so happy if you would share your testimony with us! Send it to m.rousselotpailley@mijarc.net. 

On 14th March 2020, our member organisation Umbrella from Georgia organised the second local visit planned among the activities of MIJARC Europe’s annual work plan “Rock, Paper, Participation“. The work plan focuses on seeing-judging-acting on how young people get involved in the dialogue on agricultural policies and on how they take part to sustainable agricultural practices.

The Rock, paper, participation” annual work plan is co-funded by the European Youth Foundation of the Council of Europe and the European Union.

Umbrella gathered 13 of their young members and took them on a visit to Asureti Village and to Tetritskaro Youth Center. Firstly, they visited a farm and a greenhouses that belonged to the young farmer Gocha Apciauri, located in Asureti village. He presented his farm, the technologies he used and engaged he participants in an experiential learning activity inviting them to harvest vegetables. The discussion with the farmers focused on the challenges that he faced in his daily live as a farmer and the agricultural works.

The second half of the day was spent at Tetritskaro Youth Center, where the participants explored the “ladder of Participation”, the “triangle of cooperation”, worked in groups and used non-formal learning methods to identify challenges/barriers young people face if they want to get involved in the dialogue on agricultural policies.

They based their work on the study on youth involvement in agriculture – the case of Georgia – published by MIJARC Europe especially for this visit and the Revised European Charter on the Participation of Young People in Local and Regional Life (the Charter)

Revised Charter

According to participants their involvement in agricultural policy at local level is extremely low. They were not aware of the possibilities and mechanisms of participation in decision-making process at local level. None of them had ever taken part in discussions on farming issue or had been invited to the local Sakrebulo (local legislative body) meetings. In addition to this, despite the fact that representatives of two local municipalities (Tetrsitskaro and Marneuli) were invited to the meeting, none of them sent representatives.

The young participants decided that the priorities they should focus on at local level should be:

  • Information – access to information is the top priority as quite often the information is on websites but it is not proactively published or spread in the municipality. It also considers the accessibility to internet as it is not developed in rural area.
  • Motivation – low level of motivation or nihilism among youth and non-responsive local authorities. The priority is to raise the level of motivation among young people.
  • Language barrier – in the communities with ethnic minorities (Armenians, Azerbaijanis) in some cases they face language barriers as they lack of knowledge of state language. Translation of information into native languages.
  • Political will – promoting (advocating) political will among local authorities and awareness about the positive sides of involvement of young farmers in agricultural policy development process.


Early April, about two weeks after the start of the quarantine measures taken all over the world, MIJARC Europe made the most of the fact that everybody was confined at home to launch its new social network campaign: Grow It Yourself.

The goal of this campaign: to offer a fun challenge, through the publication of photos on social networks, to encourage people to grow their own fruit and vegetables or herbs.

The aim, of course, is not to downplay the fantastic work done by farmers, nor is it to lead people to believe that everyone can become self-sufficient with a snap of the fingers. On the contrary, it is precisely because the theme of the year for MIJARC Europe is agriculture, that the Agri-Commission wanted to highlight one of the key elements of this subject, that is the food system, from the production of food to its arrival on our plates.

This is the reason why each post is associated with a caption or a link to an article that we publish on our website, in which we discuss topics related to these issues. These can be light-hearted topics such as tips on growing beans or a list of the easiest vegetables to grow, or even poems!

But we also try to think about more serious issues: what does the covid-19 crisis and its impact on the production, transport and sale of food say about our food system and our consumption habits? Why is it that by consuming locally, we are taking care of our health in addition to the environment? Why do we need to support young people who want to enter agriculture?

You can find our posts on our Facebook page or on our Instagram account. And above all, you can join us in this challenge! Grow yourself a tomato stand on your balcony and publish the picture by tagging MIJARC Europe. You can even send us texts about topics you would like us to talk about!

The Grow It Yourself Challenge is an experience we want to live with you!


On 7th March 2020, our member organisation Federation of Youth Clubs of Armenia (FYCA), organised the first local visit planned within the activities of MIJARC Europe’s annual work plan “Rock, Paper, Participation“. The work plan focuses on seeing-judging-acting on how young people get involved in the dialogue on agricultural policies and on how they take part to sustainable agricultural practices.

The Rock, paper, participation” annual work plan is co-funded by the European Youth Foundation of the Council of Europe and the European Union.

FYCA took the young participants to visit several agricultural farms in Nor Geghi (Kotayk province), Armenia.

The visits started with several meetings with local youth representatives and local & regional authorities. At first, the attendees discussed the current situation and existing challenges facing the youth in the region and explored the facts and issues raised by the study on youth involvement in agriculture done by MIJARC Europe.

Later, it was time to start the meetings with the farmers located in the region. The local visit to several agricultural farms in Armenia gathered 25 young volunteers and members from the organization, and also representatives from local and regional authorities from Kotayk province, Armenia.

Prior to the visit, the organization contacted the provincial administration representatives of Kotayk region through FYCA regional coordinator, Mari Hovakimyan. The visit was co-organized by the head of Nor Geghi community, Vardan Papyan and his administrative team.

The field visit started from “Green” intensive apple orchards, where farmers’ staff presented the basics of the fruit cultivation. The participants explored all the stages of producing apples: starting from the basic steps of orchard establishment and development to packing the ready-steady fruits for consumption. The apple orchards have been established in Nor Geghi community in 2016 and currently cover nearly 30 hectares, with the goal of expanding the area by 20 hectares in the nearest future. In addition to apple trees, pear, plum and cherry trees will also be planted there.

It is also interesting to know that the intensive orchards are harvested earlier than traditional orchards. In case of intensive orchards, up to ten times more seedlings are planted on 1 hectare of land. The farm grows a huge variety of apples and each of them is different in its own way.

Having explored the techniques and logistics of the production, it was time to carry out the second visit in the region. The next farm was a fishpond, belonging to “Ninel” LLC and providing employment opportunities to locals.

Afterwards, the team headed to the third well-known farm, “Lusakert” poultry factory. During the visit, the team got acquainted with the bird breeding conditions and technical equipment of the cultivation. As the factory staff informed, the chickens are kept in exclusively natural and ecological conditions, thus providing ecologically pure and nutritious products.

Revised Charter

The information gained during the visits were later on used to discuss about how young people could get involved in agricultural policies and firstly if they should get involved. The participants explored the Revised European Charter on the Participation of Young People in Local and Regional Life (the Charter) and its six step implementation model. The participants came to the conclusion that agricultural development is crucially important for developing rural areas. Hence, the strategies and policies promoting the development of rural areas are considered to be a high priority in the country.

In order to reach sustainable agricultural development, it is necessary to provide rural youth with sufficient access to knowledge and information, through incorporating agricultural skills in the education.
According to the discussions, it became obvious that youth’s involvement in policy dialogue is still an existing challenge in the country. Thus, young people need to have access to integrated trainings in agricultural sector and get coherent response from policy-makers and development practitioners so as to overcome those challenges.


Overall, the following conclusion was drawn in result of the local visit: agricultural development is an extremely important asset for fostering sustainable development of rural communities’ livelihood and increasing the standards of living in those areas.