* by Claudia Laricchia, Head of Institutional Relations and Global Strategic Partnerships at Future Food Institute
“Youth Climate Leaders” and “Future Food Institute”: an alliance for the first European Hub tackling Future Food for Climate Change through youth empowerment
Youth Climate Leaders (YCL) and the Future Food Institute launched their first joint “Future Food for Climate Change” Hub in Europe on Wednesday.
The Hub is located at the Future Food Institute’s Living Lab, in the heart of Bologna (Italy) in Piazza Verdi 2, one of the most ancient university areas in the world. It is visited by 3,000 people every day, and it hosts over 250 events per year. It is the place to be for startups, incubators, accelerators, universities, research centers, policymakers, change-makers, companies and climate activists driving food innovation as a way to accelerate social, cultural, environmental and economic impact.
The Hub will be the ideal home for young climate activists looking for a place to transform their global protests, which currently involves more than 2 million people, into global proposals, and plans to realize global climate actions for more resilient and sustainable food systems.
The Hub is the first YCL branch outside Brazil, and it will combine the partners’ expertise on youth engagement and climate change in the framework of FFI’s Initiatives including: “Future Food for Climate Change” Program, the upcoming trainings for climate shapers with FAO in New York (July 10 to 17), Tokyo (August 1 to 7) and Island (September 1 to 7).
Cassia Moraes, the founder of Youth Climate Leaders Network, said: “We are very proud to have found the perfect home for our vision and projects in Europe. Indeed, the Future Food Institute represents a role model for young generations and the global ecosystem where concrete climate actions happen, as well as high-level science-based policy recommendations and educational projects with the best public and private organizations in the world. We’ve chosen Bologna for our first Hub in Europe due to our partnership with the Future Food Institute and to our growing Italian community, composed by leaders from Al Gore’s Climate Reality Project, including myself and key people from the FFI team. We also want to acknowledge our partnership with Humans to Humans network, led by the Obama Foundation civic leader, Valentino Magliaro”.
Sara Roversi, the founder of the Future Food Institute, said: “Empowering young talented individuals to act for a better future is one of our main goals. That’s why the cornerstone of the Institute is Education through a unique learning platform, including K-12 programs, a Young Talent Academy, University Master’s Courses and Summer Schools. Future Food is developing a series of experience-based classes, adopting the creative learning methodologies, the “prosperity thinking” and design thinking approach, being always focused on making the “Humana communitas” the center of the equation.
Nowadays, hyperconnected society 5.0 we are living in requires cooperative and more in-depth efforts in tackling the climate crisis. With this vision, today we are launching our long term alliance with one of the most important youths climate leaders network: we need to be inclusive and stronger together in fixing the climate crisis, giving to new generations the power to raise their voices through skills, tools, opportunities to put the environmental issues on top of the humans’ agenda”.
For thousands of years, food and agriculture have been some of the most important economic, social, and cultural activities for human societies. However, trends such as population growth, change in dietary habits and climate change impose additional challenges to the task of feeding about 9 billion people by 2050. Therefore, to achieve sustainable food systems means meeting the increasing demand for food and, at the same time, reducing poverty, malnutrition, and the environmental impacts of food production.
To address these and other pressing challenges of our time, the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) were created to set universal goals that expanded the role of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) by adding other issues related to sustainable development. In this process, food and agriculture are not only the focus of one of the goals (SDG 2) but is also associated with all of them.
Together, Youth Climate Leaders (YCL) and the Future Food Institute (FFI) are now teaming up to train the next generation of leaders who will work on food solutions for a low carbon society.
Further information on Future Food Institute
FUTURE FOOD INSTITUTE (“FFI”) is the global Trust which generates and accelerates cultural, social, environmental and economic impact through food innovation, with a branch in Shanghai (China), Tokyo (Japan), San Francisco and New York (US) and led by Sara Roversi.
Future Food aims to effect evolving positive change in life on earth, promoting food innovation as a strategic element to achieve sustainable and impactful growth. Eating is an essential act for humans, but it requires consciousness and awareness. By analyzing food from both the viewpoints of culture and accessibility, we have begun to map the places where this revolution is taking place and studying its dynamics, both to grasp the opportunities and to help our partners to seize them and create new niches of fruition and consumption that use the potential of technology and new knowledge generated by data.
This is the reason why we’ve created the Future Food Network: an ecosystem focused on food innovation as a key tool to tackle the immense challenges humankind faces in the areas of affordable nutrition, world hunger, and sustainability, composed of a philanthropic soul - Future Food Institute - that wants to create new models and culture by strengthening research projects, spreading knowledge, production education as well as opportunities for positive cross-pollination and inspiration through its Future Food Institute and Food Innovation Program; and an entrepreneurial spirit supporting food corporation and institutions committed to open innovation, through its - Future Food Living Lab - that, on the basis of acquired knowledge, feeds innovative projects capable of generating concrete impact on the health of humans and the planet. The great challenge of our era is to succeed in protecting our planet, by feeding humans in a healthy way and by taking care of the ecosystem that is hosting us. Humanity will be able to adapt to the great changes we are experiencing only by putting humans back in the center.
Website: www.futurefoodinstitute.org
Twitter/instagram @FfoodInstitute
·Email: info@futurefoodinstitute.org
Further information on Youth Climate Leaders Network
Youth Climate Leaders Network (YCLN) is building a global community of practice to catalyse climate actions by providing youth with immersive training, networks, and concrete opportunities to kickstart their careers as climate leaders. Even though more than half of the world’s population is below 30, youth worldwide face great barriers to land a job or start their own initiatives in the field of climate change. Therefore, YCL offers unique learning journeys where young people can learn more about climate change in theory, understand it in practice, and work on hands-on projects to start their careers as climate leaders. Through the YCL Network, YCL Fellows remain connected and have exclusive access to professional opportunities worldwide.
YCL Hubs are innovation-driven spaces where YCL alumni can engage with themselves and with local youth to foster local action while connected to YCL’s global network. YCL Fellows, staff or partners will be appointed as Hub Coordinators, being responsible for organizing regular meetings, lectures, short courses and serving as a focal point of YCL in their designed city. YCL Hubs are co-hosted with key partners, such as FFI, who offer their office spaces and interact with the YCL community.
Together with the Hub Curators, they will oversee the group and individual projects developed by YCL Fellows, ensuring that YCL Hubs have a dynamic atmosphere and are recognized by universities, companies, international organizations, NGOs and key actors in the field of climate change and sustainability. In turn, these Hubs will promote YCL programs to the local community and connect YCL Fellows with local Field Placement and job opportunities.
·Website: https://youthclimateleaders.org/
·Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/youthclimateleaders/
·LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/27204276
·Email: info@youthclimateleaders.org
Interested in hosting a YC Hub?
If you want to co-host a YC Hub, please contact us and schedule an exploratory conversation. Requirements:
Physical space: You can either offer space from your organizations or look for local partners who can offer their space. You should have at least a room to convey meetings, and whenever possible a larger room/auditorium for lectures and courses.
Host organization and Hub coordinator: Whenever we open a Hub we look for a local organization to host it and help us to appoint a coordinator, our main local focal point.
Funding: You do not need to commit funds to launch a Hub, but as it evolves, our team is available to support your fundraising efforts to take it to the next level.
Press Office// Responsible for the partnership
Cassia Moraes - info@youthclimateleaders.org
Claudia Laricchia - info@futurefoodinstitute.org
