USAID Launches Youth Advocacy on Climate Change and Mitigation Initiative

An initiative aimed at empowering Ghanaian youth to become climate-smart leaders within the agricultural sector has been launched in Tamale in the Northern Region.

Dubbed “Youth Advocacy on Climate Change and Mitigation (YACCM)” is it an initiative of USAID Feed-the-Future Market Systems and Resilience Activity (MSR).

Launched in collaboration with key public and private sector partners, the initiative also seeks to equip youth with the knowledge, skills, and networks to drive climate change mitigation and agribusiness efforts.

In his opening remarks, Mr. Glenn Lines, Chief of Party for the MSR Activity, emphasized the importance of the programme in empowering young people within the agricultural market system.

“Today marks an important milestone in our efforts to empower youth within the agricultural market system to become champions of climate-smart practices and leaders in agribusiness. The USAID Feed-the-Future Market Systems and Resilience Activity, commonly referred to as the MSR Activity, has been instrumental in supporting this journey,” he said.

Mr. Lines also expressed gratitude to the programme’s partners, including the National Youth Authority, the Department of Agriculture, and the Ghana Enterprise Agency, for their contributions to the initiative.

For her part, Madam Zainabu Abdullai, Resilience and Social Inclusion Director at the MSR Activity, USAID Feed-the-Future, stressed the need for youth involvement in climate change advocacy.

“As we all know in recent times, how the climatic issues are becoming so rampant. Climate change is now very clear, it’s now staring on our face. Previously, others believed it was a myth, but now the reality is dawning on us,” she said.

Madam Abdullai explained the role of the YACCM initiative in helping young people address climate change.

“So, as part of MSR’s overarching approach toward building resilience market systems, there’s a core component of our initiative, our activities, which is also looking at addressing issues around climate change,” she noted.

She emphasized that youth have “critical and major roles to play when it comes to addressing issues in climate change,” adding that the initiative was developed to give young people the tools to be effective advocates.

One of the highlights of the YACCM initiative is the use of mobile phones for real-time data collection.

Madam Abdullai shared the success of this approach, saying, “We were amazed. And you know what they were using? They were just using their mobile phones. Nothing like a complex machine or a complex system for them to gather data and share. And it was so simple.”

She also emphasized the value of networking within the programme.

“The first time you brought a number of young people together through the Entrepreneurship Summit, young people from Nyo, Yendi, Karaga, they all basically were sharing ideas,” Madam Abdullai said.

“And others got to know that, oh, so then these young people are here. This is what they are doing. So, I can also network with them and then also learn”, she said.

Madam Abdullai explained that different regions face unique climate challenges and that the YACCM initiative would provide district-specific training to address these differences.

“We have identified that most of the climate issues you want to address in your various districts are not the same .So moving forward with you on this initiative, we want to provide tailored and targeted trainings to build you in those areas.”

Madam Abdullai also highlighted the peer-to-peer learning model as an effective tool for spreading climate change awareness, saying, “We realized that when we focused on youth sharing climate change information to their peers, it seemed more effective than what we had thought of. You have been identified as change agents, role models.”

Story By: Nelson Nyadror Adenuti |www.diamondfmonline.com |Ghana.