Support 150 Mauritian Youth Agripreneurs

On 31st August and 14 September 2019, Farmcity conducted its first 2 of 6 Community Workshops. We welcomed 40 junior youths from 4 different regions of Northen Mauritius - Baie du Tombeau, Terre Rouge, Triolet and Bois Marchand. Boy, did they blow us away with their insight, creativity, and strong sense of justice!

In each Community Workshop, participants were introduced to Farmcity’s mission and social enterprise model. We also shared the backstory of how Farmcity came to be - against all odds and despite the founders knowing nothing about agriculture when they started! Participants were then given a tour of the farm, where they learnt the different strategies employed to farm in harmony in nature, tasted some farm fresh produce, and even conducted a mini experiment to understand irrigation through capillary action. Nature has all the answers, and we simply need to observe and appreciate the bounties of what She has to offer.

After a brief break prepared by a wonderful local caterer, we turned the floor over to these bright, young junior youths! They were given 2 scenarios to role play - first, as Minister of Agriculture to propose ways to make agriculture attractive to youths; and then taking on a superpower to solve some of the most pressing issues facing their communities today. The depth of discussion that followed, as well as their suggestions to solve some extremely challenging problems - of drugs, of pollution, of poor health, left us wondering why we aren't involving them in our policy making process. Imagine the wonders that could be achieved if we simply gave young people a voice!

We were humbled to be given an opportunity to look at complex problems from their perspective, and deeply inspired by their resilience and tenacity, even in the face of a really challenging environment. We are convinced, contrary to much of the bad press that the 'youths of today' often get, that they will be the ones who can change the world for the better. We will be compiling the solutions that the junior youths have proposed in this series of Community Workshops (4 more upcoming!), and will share them with the leaders and decision makers of Mauritius.

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More about The Agripreneurship Program

These Community Workshops are the first of a three-part Agripreneurship Program for junior youths. We aim to use agriculture as a tool to teach entrepreneurship, so we can build the agripreneurs of tomorrow.

Community Workshops set the scene for junior youths, introducing them to the possibilities of sustainable farming in a modern way, and providing them with a safe space to first, surface some of the challenges they see in their local food system; and secondly, to propose ground-up solutions to improve it and by extension, their communities.

This will be followed by Chapter 2 where participants will dive heads-in (and hands on) learning the basics of farming. As a group, they will learn how to prepare the soil, sow seeds, manage weeds, irrigate and tend to their own bed of crops on the farm.

Their efforts will then culminate in Chapter 3: The Agripreneurs' Club, where they will follow a 10 week program to develop a selection of their ideas (raised in Chapter 1) into a first prototype to be tested on the ground. It is our belief (and hope) that improving their local food system, through initiative(s) that are developed by the community for the community, will pave the way for more postive changes. 

Watch this space for more details on how you can support these junior youths efforts!