A Market-Systems Approach with a Youth-Inclusive Lens: How Can a Market Systems Approach Facilitate Greater Youth Inclusion and Allow Youth to Thrive in the Global Agri-Food System?

International development practitioners have been applying a market systems approach to agricultural value chains to work within the systems’ new or existing rules and promoting access to the supporting functions that foster, rather than impede, agricultural growth. Recently, the industry has been asking, “how can a market systems approach facilitate greater youth inclusion and allow youth to thrive in the global agri-food system?” The Feed the Future Project Design Guide for Youth-Inclusive Agriculture and Food Systems: Volume II for USAID had a chance to address this question by applying the Market Systems Development (MSD) approach to youth’s engagement in agriculture. This poster graphically illustrates how the MSD approach interacts with youth and agriculture and highlight the 3 most relevant questions to be addressed: 1. How and to what extent are youth already engaged in agricultural value chain activities? 2. How and to what extent can youth access and are served by the supporting functions of a market system? 3. In what ways do the rules facilitate or hinder youth engagement in agriculture?