Before sunrise in Neuchâtel, Switzerland, 24-year-old Amélie moves through the dairy barn with the ease of someone who has found her calling—though the path there was anything but direct. Once trained as a hairdresser, she eventually returned to farming, the world she felt most connected to. Today she manages 50 cows on a farm in western Switzerland, part of a younger generation fighting to keep agriculture alive against rising costs, shifting regulations, and a profession that few young people want to join.
Thousands of kilometres away in Indonesia, young dairy farmers begin their mornings in much the same way: before dawn, feeding cattle, preparing milk for collection, managing farms before the heat arrives. While the landscapes and production systems differ vastly, these farmers face remarkably similar questions about productivity, sustainability, and how to build a future in agriculture. That shared reality brought them together through an exchange session organised by the ILO's Promise II Impact project, which brought Indonesian dairy cooperatives together with two young Swiss farmers—Amélie and Dylan—to share practical knowledge on dairy production, animal welfare, milk hygiene, feed management, and digital farm technologies.
Dylan, raised on a Swiss farm before his family transitioned to beef cattle, completed dairy farming training during his apprenticeship and still works occasionally on dairy farms. Like many young farmers in Switzerland, he has watched doors close for his generation. "In Switzerland, it's becoming harder for young people to establish themselves in farming," he said. "If you don't inherit a farm, it's very difficult." Across Europe, the story is the same: young people are leaving rural areas, while long hours, strict regulations, and unstable income make the profession increasingly difficult, even in one of the world's most developed agricultural systems.
The exchange revealed both the gaps and the possibilities. Swiss dairy farms achieve milk yields up to three times higher than Indonesian operations, a difference Amélie attributed to consistent government support, disciplined management practices, and digital infrastructure. On her farm, sensors and automated systems monitor production, animal health, feeding patterns, and milk quality—tools that help farmers detect problems quickly and improve efficiency. "It is this combination of support, discipline, and good practices that ensures long-term sustainability," she explained.
What struck Dylan most was the structural disadvantage facing Indonesian farmers. "The fact that farms do not always have land to produce feed for their animals was very surprising to me," he said. In Switzerland, cows commonly graze outdoors or consume forage produced on-farm; in Indonesia, many farmers must purchase feed and rely on manual systems, driving up labour demands and production costs. Animal welfare emerged as another crucial difference. Swiss farms operate under strict regulations governing housing, water access, hygiene, and veterinary care—standards that go beyond ethical responsibility to directly improve productivity and milk quality.
Yet the exchange was never meant to be a lesson in Swiss superiority. Rather, it created space for young farmers facing genuine shared challenges to learn from each other, to understand that resilience in agriculture looks different across continents but requires the same commitment. As young farmers everywhere confront an uncertain future, these conversations across borders suggest that the problems are bigger than any one country—and so too might be the solutions.