 Our actions are our future. Everyone's beautiful faces, but we will make it work. Yes. So this panel discussion, again, thank you everyone for joining me and thank you to our viewers and listeners for tuning in today for this discussion on World about World Food Day. With me, I have a few young experts in their field. I'm going to let them say a little bit about themselves, but we also have with us, I would like to say the star of the show, our very own Oprah, if you will, Dr. Renata Clark. She is FAO sub-regional coordinator for the Caribbean. So the goal for today is to basically have a short but meaningful conversation about every food systems, food, diet, health, everything to do with the Caribbean in a Caribbean context, and basically to just pose questions, share knowledge, exchange ideas, and have the young people ask questions that are relevant to them and to me, to all of us, but particularly for young people because it is our future at risk and it is our future that matters. And right now we are the ones that are supposed to hold everyone accountable. So this conversation is going to be fun, it's going to be informative, and I am very much looking forward to it. So at this point, I'm going to just let Dr. Renata Clark say a few words and then we will move on to our panelists and introduce them and then we will get the ball rolling. So Dr. Clark, it's over to you. Well, there's nothing much to say. I am the sub-regional coordinator for FAO for the Caribbean that covers the 13 English-speaking countries of the Caribbean. I like engaging with young people, so I'm looking forward to this conversation. We have limited time today, but I'll say from now, if there's something that you think you would like to follow up on, please just shoot me an email and I'd be happy to carry on this conversation in any other forum. Perfect. Thank you so much for that. Okay, so at this point, we will move on to our lovely panelists. I am fortunate enough to know each and every one of them. So we have three panelists with us today and we will start with ladies first. So in all, I just want you to give a short who you are, what field you work in, what interest you have in World Food Day, something short and snappy. So let's start with ladies first, Victoria. Victoria Cox, just give us a little introduction about who you are and World Food Day and tell us a little bit about yourself. All right, good morning everyone and thanks for having me here. My name is Victoria Cox and as Megan said, well, I am a registered dietitian. So that's what I do on a day-to-day basis. I'm a clinical dietitian. I work in private practice and as well for the Barbados Diabetes Foundation, also called the Maria Holder Diabetes Center. So I am interested in World Food Day because I talk about food all day long. I eat, sleep and breathe food. And so it will be really interesting to have this conversation for more of like a food systems and agriculture lens because typically I'm talking to people about their very specific personal food needs as it relates to their health and obviously food insecurity on sort of a one-on-one level comes up all the time because I can't suggest that someone eat healthy if they can't access healthy food. So it will sort of be just interesting to have this conversation on sort of a bigger scale because like I said, I'm talking food. If I'm talking health and nutrition, it means I'm talking food because we eat food, not individual nutrients, right? So that's kind of my take on this morning. So I'm excited to be here. Thank you so much, Victoria. Earlier I was talking about her amazing recipes that she introduced me to. So she knows her stuff when it comes to food. That being said, we're gonna move on now to Christopher Laurie, Chris. Just introduce yourself, who you are. Tell us a little bit about world food dating from your perspective and yours yours. Hi, thanks for the invitation Megan and thanks to FAO for hosting this session. And so my name is Christopher Laurie. I'm coming to you from the Heart and Stroke Foundation of Barbados. I work currently with a special projects team and we are focused on childhood obesity prevention. And within this space, we talk a lot about nutrition policies, specifically, those that help to regulate and enhance a healthy school environment. So this conversation is very topical, very relevant. One of the things that we are concerned about as well of course is when you talk about healthy foods, you have to talk about the levels of food sustainability that Victoria alluded to because you don't want to go around preaching a gospel about things that people can't access. So the agricultural sector is super important and I'm very happy to engage in this space today. Thank you so much. So at this point, Pierre, go right ahead. Thank you, Megan. So my name is Pierre Cook. I'm the technical advisor to the Healthy Caribbean Coalition. I'm also the president of the University of the West Indies Law Society and prime minister of the National Youth Parliament. And it sounds strange for me to be involved in a food conversation in a world food space, but necessarily one of my advocacy areas is talking about the health and rights of persons in health. And we all know that food has a major implication on the health outcomes of persons and that conversations around access to food. I'm researching a new space of trade conversations in relation to food and then how the law impacts the foods that we have access to and how that in turn impacts our health. So it's really a great space to pull everything together and just have a single conversation about what needs to be done to fed the right to persons, to good food and good health. Thank you so much. When Marquis asked me to basically corral some young people, I'm not gonna lie, you three were the first three that I thought of because you all come from different backgrounds. You all have a different perspective and it's always sometimes a bit of a problem when you've had the same ideas being perpetuated in these spaces. So I like the fact that everyone has something a little bit different to offer. So that being said, what is going to happen is we're going to have a conversation with Dr. Clark and you guys are actually gonna be in the driver's seat for this. I know you have some questions to pose to Dr. Clark. So I'm in the facilitating role in terms of controlling conversation. So just so that we're aware, if I think that there's a conversation that while extremely interesting has been prolonged a little bit too long just so that we can touch on other ideas, I'll just indicate via a thumbs up that we will be proceeding to another topic of conversation. So if you see my thumbs up, that means that, okay, it's time to wrap up the point and then hopefully we can move on to something else so that everyone has a chance to have an equal opportunity to talk to Dr. Clark. So with that being said, I kind of a traditionalist, so I will start with ladies first again. I know that Victoria has some questions for her. So Victoria, why don't you just start with one of your questions that you have and we'll see how the conversation goes from there. By the way, it's not a Q and A, it's extremely informal. So anyone that has a point, by all means, let's have a back and forth. I know Dr. Clark values enriching conversations. So don't be shy, don't be hesitant, just let's talk like we're having a conversation. So Victoria, take it away. All right, thank you. So when I was thinking about questions for this and like I said, my perspective is maybe a little bit different, it's not on sort of a policy level, it's just talking one-on-one with people about food. And then when I was specifically thinking about today's youth, something that comes up a lot for me is, I guess, what's presented as healthy on social media, on Instagram, food that looks real aesthetically pleasing and it looks really healthy and everybody's talking about how it is, it's non-GMO, it's organic, it's local, it's all of these wonderful things. But then sometimes that sort of almost perfect image of healthy eating overwhelms people when they feel like they can't access the more kind of the organic produce or certain things. So I was just, I guess, wondering how do we engage young people and sort of bring more, I guess, transparency in terms of, I guess, conventional agriculture and farming and not everything. You can still get a lot of nutrition and a lot of benefits from a conventionally farmed food as if not necessarily organic produce or non-GMO produce. Because I'll almost sort of see people think, well, if they can't get what they consider to be the gold standard of healthy eating, they just don't really bother trying to get produce at all necessarily because it seems so unattainable. So just, I guess my questions were around like engaging young people and sort of having youth leaders in terms of showing, oh, this is what healthy eating can also look like and that sort of spun to my question about encouraging people to eat ugly fruits and veggies, which I think is a fun concept that I'd started to hear about when I was living overseas. So sort of a jumbled, not very concise question, but there you go. It was an interesting question. Let me go to the first bit about, what people understand as being healthy or even your point about how can you bring more transparency? Because I think this is an important concept, particularly in a country that imports 80% of its food, what's happened to this food before it gets to me. I mean, there are few things that are as intimate as we are with our food. I mean, these are things we put inside of us. So we are very concerned. It's important from a point of view of, okay, when we speak of organic, for instance, and for sure, FAO is a big proponent of integrated pest management. In other words, reducing chemical inputs, using a mixture of approaches to make sure that your crops can grow well, but reducing the need for agricultural chemicals. They will be necessary, but keep them as low as possible and organic even more so. The main benefits there are environmental. The chemicals that enter our soils, our water systems, and so clearly there's a huge environmental advantage. There's a huge workers health advantage in terms of spraying of pesticides. But in terms of the risk of pesticide residues, it's interesting. I mean, I've seen surveys from all over the world. Generally consumers rank this as a high priority. In reality, when you look at the data and what is actually causing harm, pesticide residues are very low on that list of things. There are microbiological pathogens, viruses and bacteria. There are mycotoxins from, we have evidence that these are the things that consumers should be more concerned about. But all over the world, there's this in our collective imaginary, we think that pesticides are the biggest problem in relation to food safety, which is not borne out by the evidence. So, perhaps, and we talk about transparency and discussion, we do need to have more conversations about what are the real risks, what should consumers really be concerned about. I should make one aside, a proviso in relation to the pesticide, that pesticide residues are not, generally not a serious food safety issue wants, they are used well. So, if you have farmers who are not trained or dealing with a pest issue that they really haven't got guidance on, so they're putting the wrong pesticides, or in the case of the Caribbean, we always hear about previous larceny. When someone steals fruit or vegetables, they don't know when the last pesticide application was, so that the time has not been respected. So, I'm not saying it could never be a problem, but good agricultural practice with traditional agriculture, it is much less of a problem than people think. I can speak to you about your ugly veggies and, of course, the notion there is, along the same lines, don't, you know, don't drive for, you know, that you can't have a single insect damage or some misshapen, which tends to drive two things, chemical use, but also waste. And I'm going to come back to the issue of waste, hopefully in our conversation, because that's an interesting thing. So, you know, I think those campaigns on ugly veggies, I think they're very, very constructive. And I think all people need is information. You know, if people are aware on what is the impact of waste and how, you know, the environmental benefit of not using loads of pesticides, I think we can all benefit. Yeah, thank you so much for that. Yeah, that's, I really love what you said in terms of, you know, the transparency, as far as what the evidence says versus kind of what we or the people tend to perceive as what we should be concerned about versus, you know, what the evidence maybe says we can be concerned about, as well as just going into the benefits, like you said, of reduction of pesticide use and what that looks like. Yes, because it's just so interesting for me to see, like I said, on a one-on-one basis, and I'll be quick and brief, but like, you know, I've had people who are so hyper-focused on the possibility of pesticides on their, say vegetables, but on a daily basis, they're consuming lots of like canned processed meats. And it's sort of like, there's a break there in, I guess, the thought process, you know what I mean? So being able to bring some light, talk about what the evidence says and the thought process behind everything would be super valuable. So thank you so much. Thank you. Yes, I must echo Victoria's sentiments about what we focus on versus what actually might be more harmful. So I took a note of that because you're right, I do think pesticides first, but you're saying that there actually might be some things that we need to consider that we have not been considering in terms of what is and is not harmful. Before I move on to Chris, I just want to know if either Chris or Pierre had a point to add. No pressure, obviously, but just open it up to you guys before I move on to Chris to ask his question. If, yeah. So if no one, Chris, go ahead. I'll let Pierre go because I'll make my comment and then pose my next question as well. No problem. Yeah. No, I was saying again why these types of conversations are important because a dimension I never really considered was those ugly vegetables and just how much that can lead to waste and increased use of certain chemicals in order to present to customers something that they find appealing. And I think it's important for persons like myself and other advocates or persons involved in this space to engage more conversations around, having access to foods but also understanding that all food isn't good food but necessarily when you look at your produce and what you're picking, we need to have serious conversation about what that food should look like and how our thoughts and ideas behind what vegetables should look like can contribute to food wastage and I know that's a serious global conversation as well. So that dimension of the conversation is very important to highlight as an outcome from today's chat. Yeah, definitely. I used to be guilty of tossing a fruit if it had like a little bit of a mark. Even though it's perfectly fine, I could just cut it out. I would toss it or I would just discard not even look at it if I was in the supermarket. So I've had to train myself to accept that fruit isn't supposed to be perfect. If we as humans are not perfect, why do we expect our fruit to be perfect? So I do take more notice of that. That being said, Chris, I know that you have a question, so go right ahead. Can I just say something about food waste because this is an important issue. I don't know how many of you are aware that the SDG12 actually includes an indicator on the reduction of waste and the target is that countries should be reducing waste by 50% by 2030 and by definition what they consider as waste separate from food loss. They consider food waste to be what is lost at the stage of retail or the consumer. And right now that's at around, it's estimated to be around 17%. And when you think that the agricultural system accounts for about 30% of the greenhouse gas production and you think of the natural resources that go into producing food, the thought that you just waste 17% of it is completely unforgivable. So we certainly all have to take those steps to reduce waste and eating ugly vegetables is certainly an important first step. Yes, for sure. Thanks so much for that, Dr. Clark. Chris, I'm gonna let you go ahead. I'm keeping an eye on the time, so. No worries, nice Megan. And thank you, Dr. Clark, for that clarification. That was one of my concerns as well on the topic of food loss and food wastage, particularly with local produce because we tend to think the grass is always greener on the other side. So once it's marked as a local product, we think that it's inferior and we tend to shy away from it, which is mind boggling to me when those are the most nutritionally dense and healthy for you. And those are what you want to eat locally and seasonally. And on that note, shifting the stigma away from the food product itself a little to the process of agriculture and farming. I was curious to get your views on how do we encourage young persons to step into agriculture? Because we know that traditionally agriculture, unfortunately, does have a colonial pass, a colonial legacy. And people think that if you step into agriculture or farming, it's because you didn't perform well in school, you weren't able to become a doctor or a lawyer. And there is money to be made in economies of scale more than what these traditional professions are making. So how do we get more Barbadian's, more Caribbean young persons to become involved in this industry? Thank you, Christopher, for a thought provoking question. It's a conversation that I've had from time to time with Megan as well. And we hear a lot about people saying, oh, you need to make agriculture sexy. And I resist that notion, my conversation with Megan and other young people with whom I've had this discussion is no, we do need to make people understand that there is a future and there is satisfaction that you can earn a much more than decent living from agriculture. So yes, we have this image of working in the yard, hoeing and getting sweaty and being poor. And yet there are very few people who make the option of I choose to work very hard but never have any money. So the issue is how do we demonstrate that agriculture can be viable, not just economically, although remuneration is important but also from that perspective of satisfaction. I know I'm making a contribution. I am able to use my imagination to do things differently than they were before. And believe me, that is precisely what we need to do. There's a lot of talk about transforming agriculture. You don't transform agriculture by keeping doing the same things. You transform agriculture by approaching problems differently, by leveraging technology. So when I get into those conversations with people saying, oh, young people like digital, if you make it sexy for them, they'll go. And for me, they've got it the wrong way around. We need to first of all analyze the situation and understand where the opportunities lie. I mean, Barbados is never going to be the bread basket of the world but we can do a whole lot better than we have been doing. Where do the opportunities lie? Make sure that the business case is clear that young people do see a future. The innovation that I'm talking about is going to be part of it. We don't have economies of scale. So we do need to choose how we do things to really optimize the outcomes. And this is an area where FAO is trying to use its global networks to help leverage technology. So it's about using the technology to improve productivity and competitivity. It's not about let's make agriculture look sexy so young people will join. I mean, there is a point of convergence but there are two different thought processes behind. So we and the supporting institutions need to make that case for agriculture. We need to facilitate innovation. We need to facilitate access to finance. There are several UN agencies now that are also looking at innovative financing mechanisms to make sure that young people can with good ideas can access finance. Okay, so there's a lot to do but what we need more than anything is energy and vision. So and we're looking to the youth for that. We have failed. We haven't done it right. Now we have to throw our energy behind you. Thank you so much Dr. Clark. You said that we need to identify the areas that are basically areas of opportunity not to put you on the spot but for any young person listening who is curious but doesn't know where to start could you off the top of your head think of any of these areas of opportunities that you see in Barbadian context or even the regional context that you see young people could possibly turn their eye to but they might not know about. Now, I hate to give you a boring answer but the answer is that we are trying to walk the talk in other words, not just jumping in and doing anything but we're spending a lot more time analyzing value chains really making that argument for this is where we see opportunities and market potential and we're doing that in several countries. It's a slow process and we are doing this in Barbados as well. So I think more than telling people what value chains show promise I'd like people to tune in to a different way of thinking in other words, agriculture isn't getting a piece of land and getting whatever seeds or plantlets you have and hoping for the best. It is an exercise that is more cerebral. I think Christopher referred to, oh, you know it's the dumb people that have no options that do this. No, it is the people who can imagine and think laterally and find ways to get the most out of, you know our limited natural resource space. And it is, and one of the things that I did want to say when speaking about getting youth in agriculture if we can get things right, youth in agriculture is not just the guy, you know planting or harvesting or even processing but can we get the technologies around agriculture because if we are innovating, they're all of those spin offs the people who are creating the technologies the people who are maintaining the technologies, you know I wouldn't say that everything is possible but a whole lot more is possible than what we've been doing now. Thank you so much for that because what you're basically saying is counter to what the stereotype is you actually require creativity you require some innovation you can't be a dumb person so to speak you need to have something up there to how do you make so much out of so little that requires a talent, a skill, insight that not everybody possesses and creativity so before I move on to Pierre for his question I just wanted to know if anyone had something to add to the conversation currently Victoria, Chris, Pierre himself, anyone if not we can just move on to Pierre's question. I think I just agree sorry with that idea that it has that stereotype as opposed to the fact that it requires so much innovation and creativity and business insight as well you know it's a business and I just wish that even like our schooling system incorporated more of that say in business classes and things like that because I do feel like we have this very sort of stereotypical are you gonna go into medicine are you gonna go into law are you gonna you know kind of mindset from the time we're quite young and I just think it would be great to you know showcase that there are other opportunities and agriculture is an impressive one with a lot of that requires a lot of insight yeah. Chris, are Pierre anything or? Yes I would love to echo Victoria's sentiments with regard to a reimagination of what the school curriculum looks like and what we push and promote. I mean I met Victoria through after school lessons in chemistry and biology and she went into diastetics I went to medicine and I ultimately talked to health research but neither of us I'm sure had ever thought about how do we translate this information and this know-how into an agricultural lens and I think that is so unfortunate because it is obviously a career pathway and I specifically emphasize career and not just a hobby it's not an after school project it's not a backyard garden you can make money from this you can be productive you can be a valuable member of society and it's not it doesn't have to be a stigmatized area so I think that the more that we can reach people at a younger age and I'm so glad that FAO is engaging youth on this topic specifically and hopefully you know younger and younger ages and stages even that we can start to push this narrative and encourage persons to reevaluate what it means to go into sustainable farming you know building climate resilient resources all of these kind of things it is a very technically sound area and it does require that level of creativity so definitely push on the education. Thank you so much Chris with that lovely point made I'm gonna go over to Pierre so that he can ask his question. Yeah, no I just wanted to comment very quickly on the points made earlier and again I think in the same way that Chris and Victoria's experience that my experience of the education system has been persons who pursue agriculture and farming that area you see it as a throwaway subject or something that necessarily you just do because it's a passion and not to make any money or to do as a profession and even then those persons are seen as less than academically than other persons but I do think more and more with these conversations we will find more young persons being engaged and interested in the space but what I would like to see more of is a more concrete commitment to supporting youth in these ventures as much as it takes creativity and skill to think about how to make it sexy or how to make it fun or how to make it lucrative there needs to be financial commitments to supporting young people in these areas and oftentimes we have the conversations around youth need to get involved in this space and youth need to help with climate resilience and youth need to help with pushing the food agenda but then we see a lack of the stronger commitments that is needed to see those projects actually be put in place so that type of commitment is what is needed going forward those concrete internship commitments financial commitments to support the ideas and initiatives of youth so that we can move from a place of ideation into implementation and actual change in our food systems and as the law student on the panel I think my question shifts us to a more technical space where we had and it was mentioned earlier that we import in Barbados at least about 80% of our food and my question would be what kind of food import regulations do we need not only Barbados but maybe across the region to strengthen our food systems in order to ensure that the best products are available to the Caribbean people so whether that's a conversation around front-of-package warning labels a conversation around what types of food we accept and where we accept them from and what standard or quality we expect them to be what are those food import regulations that are needed or need to be strengthened to ensure the best food is available to our people Okay Pierre, now law student Pierre for sure the regulation and import regulations are important and that they're all kinds of regulations and you've mentioned some of them for example regulations labeling requirements requiring that manufacturers provide information about nutrition and health and I know that that discussion is going on vigorously and healthy Caribbean coalition is front and centre of that of that discussion so yes and I'm pleased to know that the healthy Caribbean coalition is or will soon be an observer in the Codex Elementarius Commission where you can actually be engaging and engaging Caribbean countries in shaping those regulations because before we talk about implementing regulations that we are in a very globalised world it's not that each country comes up with its own idea of what regulations should be because that would cause huge disruptions in terms of moving food around the globe so being engaged at global and regional levels in terms of determining appropriate regulation is key having the capacities to enforce because having something on paper is one thing being able to enforce it is something completely different and here again this is where I know in Barbados at the moment there are discussions about strengthening and reorganising agriculture health and food safety systems so the enforcement is important so there are nutrition regulations in terms of labelling in terms of composition of certain foods for special dietary uses whether they be infant foods or other kind of special foods there are food safety regulations we were speaking earlier about pesticide residues and pathogens so there are all kinds of regulations that need to be enforced effectively to make sure that food is safe but the bottom line around having a better quality of food available or addressing the issue of food systems and strengthen food systems goes beyond that and it's to do with everything we've been saying before one could argue that if you're importing between 80 to 90% of your food this is a fundamental problem with your food system and addressing that requires all of the things that we've been speaking about we need to be much more clear with ourselves about what we can produce how we innovate now the link between innovation and regulation and legislation I think is important that we understand because as we start to evolve the way that we produce food we have to be aware that the governance of those innovations is important so we have to be sure that our regulatory system keeps up with our innovation in production to make sure that all of the checks and balances are being met so it's not about legislation that will fix the problem but legislation and regulation are needed to support a system as it evolves and transforms thank you so much for that I just want to know if anyone had any follow-ups to what Dr Clark talked about I particularly like to point about the support the legislation needs to support the innovation basically which also goes to Pierre's point about how we need to have concrete commitment and what does that look like and Dr Clark gave us an example of what that looks like stronger legislation so at this point we are at the official end but the conversation has been so good and I feel like we barely scratch the surface I'm begging if Dr Clark can spare us another 10 minutes I feel like some people might want to get into some more questions so if just 10 more minutes and then people let Dr Clark go because I know she has a busy schedule I'm enjoying this so yes you definitely can spend 10 more minutes perfect see guys so that being said I am going to go back to Victoria so we're going to keep it on a rotation I know you had another question this probably will be your last question so I don't want to put any pressure but make it your best question that you could think about the moment I feel like I went out the game strong with my best question now I'm under the pressure because I just feel like you know and like I kept sort of saying that I was coming to this with sort of almost a small scale perspective because I just as a person I get so overwhelmed thinking about how big the food system is like I find it almost anxiety inducing when I think about it on such a big scale when on a day to day I'm just trying to troubleshoot with that person in front of me how are we going to help you eat healthier in a way that you can afford and that's realistic for you so I feel like my questions tend to be on the smaller scale because the other question that I was thinking about was just locally what are the opportunities for young people to kind of get exposure to what the farming sort of industry is like in Barbados because like I said I think my exposure to it was really minimal and it was always put across as that oh maybe your school has a little front garden and it's sort of just a fun learning experience as opposed to seeing what it's like as a career so it was just sort of wondering if and what sort of the opportunities that might already exist that I don't know about are kind of locally for exposing young people to what opportunities lie in agriculture that's a that's a nice question and I will answer as well as I can although I'm sure there are lots of opportunities that I don't know about I can tell you when I joined this office in 2019 this is pre-COVID sounds like you know pre we're in an era pre-COVID I visited an experimental farm it was being run by an NGO Think Design and one of the it was very interesting because they were playing around with using solar solar panels to be growing under shade so farmers are basically producing electricity and producing food it was really it so it was a and the most important thing connecting with your question is that they were dedicated to bringing youth in to experience this experimental production so you know teaching them to keep their eyes open and imagine possible solutions and figure out what works best so I was inspired by that I think it's great and I'm still hoping that FAO can find a way to support that and similar initiatives we are and we are doing as I mentioned before work around value chain assessment to be supporting farming groups or producing producer groups to be able to produce better for the market but our starting point is usually people who have already identified agriculture so they're they're in producer groups or farmers groups already but what you mentioned and and you know several of you were speaking about wouldn't it be great if there was a different treatment of agriculture in curricula and this will be a process I suppose rather than a than in a moment but it may be a small start but I know we one of the things that that our fisheries group here was trying to do is they were working on the integrated aquaculture aquaponics systems and there was a and it's it's still ongoing an effort to be putting some of these units in schools so that you know the children can see that agriculture can be many things and that innovation is a part of it so this is part of the idea of introducing young people at a very early stage to a different notion of agriculture thank you so much Dr Clark considering the time crunch I'm just going to go quickly on to Chris to see if he had one more question to ask you Chris Chris I can make one since you're here and I know you love this kind of conversation I just wanted to touch very briefly on the idea of inclusion and gender equity within the space of agriculture and sustainable farming we know that we have a strong example in St Lucian of Helen's daughters who work specifically with encouraging females to step into the agricultural space so what are there any measures or any kind of areas that you perceive Dr Clark that younger persons more women persons with disabilities and or learning impairments how can they become involved in this conversation and space and career pathway well we do have ongoing programs jointly with UN women with a focus on getting women and youth more engaged so it's a question of really targeting you know making sure that at least a certain proportion of our beneficiaries are indeed women but I think you know I'm sorry to be repetitive but the bottom line is portraying the opportunities that agriculture presents you know it is not just backbreaking work that might not appeal to many it can be many things and as long as we are successful at demonstrating opportunity and of course vigilant to make sure that there are there are no barriers to women getting in we will find a lot more women and youth engaging we need to create the opportunity we need to show that it can work definitely and to that point I think another issue that I've witnessed in my own experience here at FAO is that we present some opportunities but sometimes a demographic doesn't really access that because there are unique challenges that prevent them from actually fully maximizing those opportunities so it's one thing to present them but also if you realize that a certain demographic even though we say hey this is available hey do you know about this why are they not accessing I think we still need to ask our question what is stopping them from fully the barriers that you mentioned why are we are we not seeing an intake and uptake of inclusivity even though we have the best of intentions so I just wanted to point make that particular point as well to buttress yours Dr Clark and now we're going to move on to Pierre and see if he has one final question before we leave the room for final comments so Pierre yeah thank you again now the other questions I have were a bit heavier but to lighten up the space a bit I think generally as as a young person involved in these conversations around empowering youth and providing them with the platforms and spaces and financial support to push messages and engage in real activism I think my question would be just what are those priority areas I know we spoke about you know conversations around ugly foods and why that needs to be normalized what are those priority areas that youth advocates and young persons can get involved in to help spread a message of a better food systems or a better understanding of food systems so that I too can support the FBO objectives and as the G2 I think it was mentioned yeah you know something comes to mind I haven't had time to think it through but I'll just throw it in there you know I've said already that we can't transform agriculture without doing things differently transforming ourselves our ways of thinking our ways of doing and delivering and you know they're I suppose I would like to see even driven by the youth that insistence that you know at the beginning of this conversation I can't remember who said it maybe it was Megan or or was spoke about accountability you know we are accountable to you we do want we do want you to be driving us to do things differently us not just FBO but all of us working in agriculture asking us questions what are we doing to change what are we doing to get better because there's a certain as always reluctance to change I need that young people be driving making sure that we don't lose energy along the way there are a couple of innovations that in this office we've been focused on and you know I come when I speak about it from some people I get a lot of energy wow that's great and from other people I get you know well you know well why why change or let me make it concrete one of them relates to novel animal feeds and animal feeds we talk about increasing animal production and replacing imports our governments have given us a clear mandate reduce imports by 25 percent we're importing most of our animal feed so when I start talking about novel animal feed and we started this already in 2019 the first project was around fish silage using waste from fish markets to make silage that can be a feed ingredient the other one relates to insect rearing you know insects can change the protein content of waste foods can upgrade the protein content and it can be used as a feed ingredient great some from some people I get excitement okay how can it work what are the controls because there are controls for everything remember what I told you regulation and good practice have to evolve as we change our production system but from some other people I hear ooh I don't want my chickens eating worms you know and I wonder well what do you think your yard falls are running around eating you know what what do you think your pigs are eating this reluctance to think about things differently so if you ask is there something that young people can do inquire and advocate and militate for the change that we need to see to transform agriculture I do remember you raising that novel food feeds system in innovation I do remember you mentioning that to me and I was like oh that's different but I can see use and I can see why that is something that we need to start thinking about what can we do differently and as young people it's kind of our role to be the change makers and to push for these types of innovation so I'm sure you've given us a lot to think about today I am going to wrap up because I know we're a little bit over time and you are as I mentioned before extremely busy I think you mentioned this might have been your fourth meeting for the day so I'm really grateful that you were able to squeeze us in today to have this conversation you've given us some things to think about I'm going to let Victoria, Chris or Pierre are there any final comments just before we finally wrap up and no pressure you don't have to say anything I think finally I just sorry I think finally I'd just like to say that this type of conversation and these types of engagement need to continue and probably in a structured way that allows us to move from conversation into ideation and implementation and the creation of real projects and programs by youth for youth that can help to see tangible change within our food systems I think that's where we need to move to next moving into the implementation of certain things that we all know and would like to see but we just need the support to put them in place and the resources in terms of human resources ideas minds and thinking to actually execute these things so that you can have better food systems for all yeah Thanks so much Pierre I can definitely say that this will not be the last session for sure Dr. Clark has shown extreme enthusiasm for young people in this area and I know the comms team listening is extremely excited and thought that this session was went extremely well so I can safely say that this won't be the last session and you're right we do need to have these conversations and more of them perhaps in a more informal setting where we can actually get down to the nitty gritty and come up with an actual plan and strategy because this isn't a good first step but you'll always need a conversation about how do we implement these ideas that we have so I am going to leave it there thank you so much Pierre thank you Victoria thank you Chris I appreciate you taking the time to participate I knew I would not be disappointed because you've each come with something completely different and just add value to the conversation so thank you for taking the time Dr Clark thank you so much for those who have tuned in thank you it has always a pleasure to sit down and talk about young people in the agriculture agri-food system and with that I am going to give an official sign off so thank you everyone have a great day night evening whenever you're viewing this and we'll talk to you later bye happy world food day