- Published on
Friðrik Thorsson. Photo: IACN
Friðrik Thorsson’s Discussion Reflection
Youth as the Future’s Foremost Stakeholders
We have the pleasure and honour of publishing a reflection on the discussion delivered at the Arctic Frontiers conference. The conference was held in February 2026 in Tromsø, Norway. The discussion was part of the panel session organised by the CAP-SHARE project, entitled ‘Intergenerational Capacity Sharing: The Connection Between Nature and Youth’.
The text was originally written in English.
Discussion Reflection:
Youth as the Future’s Foremost Stakeholders
Friðrik Thorsson
Project Manager & Deputy Director, IACN – Icelandic Arctic Cooperation Network
Why I admire this project.
My attendance at the 2026 Arctic Frontiers conference in Tromsø was marked by the wonderful opportunity granted to me by the CAP-SHARE project team to discuss a matter that is dear to me: ensuring that stakeholder perspectives and values are heard, understood and acted upon by those empowered to make final decisions.
Of course, this is something most people agree is important, at least in principle. However, it is when one looks at the practicalities that things tend to appear amiss. Like in a whispering game, a compounding process runs the risk of losing parts of the bigger picture with each step. Things are lost in translation, overlooked, affected by practical constraints, or are misunderstood or misinterpreted. Resolving this requires taking into account structural aspects relating to the development of effective communities of practice centred on the practical use of frameworks and tools that streamline and empower the knowledge-policy interface – from stakeholders and local communities to scientists, experts and policymakers.
This is where my appreciation for the work that CAP-SHARE does comes into play, as I find that their efforts to empower this process to be crucial for the sort of effective Arctic governance that is so necessary in these rapidly evolving times.
Why this matters to me.
To put into context why this matters to me personally, I will begin by telling you a little bit about myself. I had the privilege of growing up on a rural farm in the valleys of West Iceland. With this privilege came opportunities to surround myself with nature, tend to animals, swim in the river and catch charr. Having no other frame of reference, I took this all for granted. It didn’t come with any awareness – it was just life. Normal stuff.
The moment of realization came when a landmark glacier visible from my valley was declared dead back in 2014; the first to go extinct in Iceland since settlement. The depth of one’s relationship to something rarely ever becomes as apparent as when it has been lost. I realized, in retrospect, that these phenomena which we take for granted as part of normal, daily life are indeed exactly that. My normal – both a fundamental aspect of my identity and the vector through which I perceived reality – suddenly proved to be mortal.
It took a reality check for me to finally realize the fragility of my natural environment – something well understood by the many Arctic, and particularly Indigenous, communities who are even more closely connected and reliant upon it than I ever was. I do not intend to lose yet another piece of it without putting up a fight. I recognize that I have a say in terms of how the ship is steered. But being heard is another thing entirely.
The part I try to play.
Today, I work as project manager for the Icelandic Arctic Cooperation Network, an organization based in Akureyri, which serves as Iceland’s hub for Arctic governance and knowledge production. Our close involvement in this process has afforded us the opportunity to observe how the interface operates: what works, what doesn’t, and what often isn’t even considered. I was therefore happy to provide some insight on the first question posed to me in the panel in particular:
What experiences have you had collaborating with researchers, policymakers or authorities? What has worked well, and what needs to change?
I was thankful to receive such a good question. After all, effective capacity-sharing includes learning where processes fail and redesigning them.
In regard to what needs to change, one of the most glaring pitfalls in this process is a far too frequent misalignment between national policies and goals and regional realities. This fragmentation is especially evident in the Arctic and in rural areas. Accordingly, there is a need for a clearer, cross-cutting vision that encompasses all policies. Human realities cannot be reduced to singular concerns and solutions, so there needs to be increased efforts aimed at the mutual alignment of youth, gender, environmental and climate policies, to name but a few.
We note that such alignment, especially for cross-border attempts at governance on a human scale, requires data that is compatible across regions. Moreover, this data needs to be appropriately disaggregated to statistically represent how different strata intersect not only with one another, but also with the environment, in the case of climate change mitigation policy.
Lastly, but perhaps most fundamentally, there needs to be greater awareness of the inherent value of true stakeholder engagement. Capacity-sharing is not simply a transfer of skills from ‘experts’ to a subject group. Every stakeholder – or ‘youth’, as is the case in this project – is an expert on their own lived realities. Therefore, stakeholder engagement must occur right from the very beginning of the policy process. Proper engagement, involvement and tools such as Free, Prior, and Informed Consent (FPIC) are not mere box-ticking exercises – they are guarantees of efficiency and risk-mitigating factors.
Alongside this acknowledgement comes the need to address the frequent incompatibility between research funding windows and the time required to establish trust and good faith. Resources must also be allocated to provide adequate support and ensure that rights holders, knowledge holders and stakeholders are duly compensated for their participation. This is no pipe dream; it is practically feasible and proven to work.
In your work at the IACN, how has what you mentioned earlier regarding youth participation been put into practice?
A good example of our attempt to actualize the sort of engagement I mentioned – both in terms of what worked and what we learned from it – is our work on the Pan-Arctic Report on Gender Equality in the Arctic. It serves as a good example of what one may expect from the knowledge-policy interface, due to its policy impact. Since its publication through the Arctic Council’s Sustainable Development Working Group, it has been reflected in subsequent Arctic strategies of Iceland and the Arctic Council, as per the Reykjavík Declaration of 2021.
However, as a case study in process design, it made very genuine efforts to ensure extensive youth engagement. Rather than simple ‘comments at the end’, the report embedded a Youth Advisory Group throughout the process, with talent drawn specifically from the Arctic Youth Network. This included theme selection, chapter review, feedback sessions and representation on the Editorial Committee.
This engagement was a real no-brainer from a research perspective. As a demographic group, youth are crucial to understanding ongoing social processes, regardless of the subject. Even if we were to limit ‘youth’ to the ages of 15-29, this group would still comprise a quarter of the Arctic’s total population. Also, not only is it the strongest predictive group for long-term demographic, mobility and labour trends, but it is also the section of the population in which Indigeneity, gender, geography and opportunity structures intersect in by far the most visible way. And who knows more about such things than those currently experiencing them?
This focus is especially relevant considering the glacial pace at which policy can react to reality. Ten years of engagement, research, deliberation and, finally, policy implementation can feel like the blink of an eye. But to a person just finishing school, such a span of time can easily determine the rest of their life.
The importance of centring policy around youth when it comes to long-term sustainability makes the inherent value of their engagement so readily obvious. As mentioned previously, this value must be reflected in the allocation of resources and direct compensation to the stakeholders with whom one needs to collaborate.
Youth as the Future’s Foremost Stakeholders
We have the pleasure and honour of publishing a reflection on the discussion delivered at the Arctic Frontiers conference. The conference was held in February 2026 in Tromsø, Norway. The discussion was part of the panel session organised by the CAP-SHARE project, entitled ‘Intergenerational Capacity Sharing: The Connection Between Nature and Youth’.
The text was originally written in English.
Discussion Reflection:
Youth as the Future’s Foremost Stakeholders
Friðrik Thorsson
Project Manager & Deputy Director, IACN – Icelandic Arctic Cooperation Network
Why I admire this project.
My attendance at the 2026 Arctic Frontiers conference in Tromsø was marked by the wonderful opportunity granted to me by the CAP-SHARE project team to discuss a matter that is dear to me: ensuring that stakeholder perspectives and values are heard, understood and acted upon by those empowered to make final decisions.
Of course, this is something most people agree is important, at least in principle. However, it is when one looks at the practicalities that things tend to appear amiss. Like in a whispering game, a compounding process runs the risk of losing parts of the bigger picture with each step. Things are lost in translation, overlooked, affected by practical constraints, or are misunderstood or misinterpreted. Resolving this requires taking into account structural aspects relating to the development of effective communities of practice centred on the practical use of frameworks and tools that streamline and empower the knowledge-policy interface – from stakeholders and local communities to scientists, experts and policymakers.
This is where my appreciation for the work that CAP-SHARE does comes into play, as I find that their efforts to empower this process to be crucial for the sort of effective Arctic governance that is so necessary in these rapidly evolving times.
Why this matters to me.
To put into context why this matters to me personally, I will begin by telling you a little bit about myself. I had the privilege of growing up on a rural farm in the valleys of West Iceland. With this privilege came opportunities to surround myself with nature, tend to animals, swim in the river and catch charr. Having no other frame of reference, I took this all for granted. It didn’t come with any awareness – it was just life. Normal stuff.
The moment of realization came when a landmark glacier visible from my valley was declared dead back in 2014; the first to go extinct in Iceland since settlement. The depth of one’s relationship to something rarely ever becomes as apparent as when it has been lost. I realized, in retrospect, that these phenomena which we take for granted as part of normal, daily life are indeed exactly that. My normal – both a fundamental aspect of my identity and the vector through which I perceived reality – suddenly proved to be mortal.
It took a reality check for me to finally realize the fragility of my natural environment – something well understood by the many Arctic, and particularly Indigenous, communities who are even more closely connected and reliant upon it than I ever was. I do not intend to lose yet another piece of it without putting up a fight. I recognize that I have a say in terms of how the ship is steered. But being heard is another thing entirely.
The part I try to play.
Today, I work as project manager for the Icelandic Arctic Cooperation Network, an organization based in Akureyri, which serves as Iceland’s hub for Arctic governance and knowledge production. Our close involvement in this process has afforded us the opportunity to observe how the interface operates: what works, what doesn’t, and what often isn’t even considered. I was therefore happy to provide some insight on the first question posed to me in the panel in particular:
What experiences have you had collaborating with researchers, policymakers or authorities? What has worked well, and what needs to change?
I was thankful to receive such a good question. After all, effective capacity-sharing includes learning where processes fail and redesigning them.
In regard to what needs to change, one of the most glaring pitfalls in this process is a far too frequent misalignment between national policies and goals and regional realities. This fragmentation is especially evident in the Arctic and in rural areas. Accordingly, there is a need for a clearer, cross-cutting vision that encompasses all policies. Human realities cannot be reduced to singular concerns and solutions, so there needs to be increased efforts aimed at the mutual alignment of youth, gender, environmental and climate policies, to name but a few.
We note that such alignment, especially for cross-border attempts at governance on a human scale, requires data that is compatible across regions. Moreover, this data needs to be appropriately disaggregated to statistically represent how different strata intersect not only with one another, but also with the environment, in the case of climate change mitigation policy.
Lastly, but perhaps most fundamentally, there needs to be greater awareness of the inherent value of true stakeholder engagement. Capacity-sharing is not simply a transfer of skills from ‘experts’ to a subject group. Every stakeholder – or ‘youth’, as is the case in this project – is an expert on their own lived realities. Therefore, stakeholder engagement must occur right from the very beginning of the policy process. Proper engagement, involvement and tools such as Free, Prior, and Informed Consent (FPIC) are not mere box-ticking exercises – they are guarantees of efficiency and risk-mitigating factors.
Alongside this acknowledgement comes the need to address the frequent incompatibility between research funding windows and the time required to establish trust and good faith. Resources must also be allocated to provide adequate support and ensure that rights holders, knowledge holders and stakeholders are duly compensated for their participation. This is no pipe dream; it is practically feasible and proven to work.
In your work at the IACN, how has what you mentioned earlier regarding youth participation been put into practice?
A good example of our attempt to actualize the sort of engagement I mentioned – both in terms of what worked and what we learned from it – is our work on the Pan-Arctic Report on Gender Equality in the Arctic. It serves as a good example of what one may expect from the knowledge-policy interface, due to its policy impact. Since its publication through the Arctic Council’s Sustainable Development Working Group, it has been reflected in subsequent Arctic strategies of Iceland and the Arctic Council, as per the Reykjavík Declaration of 2021.
However, as a case study in process design, it made very genuine efforts to ensure extensive youth engagement. Rather than simple ‘comments at the end’, the report embedded a Youth Advisory Group throughout the process, with talent drawn specifically from the Arctic Youth Network. This included theme selection, chapter review, feedback sessions and representation on the Editorial Committee.
This engagement was a real no-brainer from a research perspective. As a demographic group, youth are crucial to understanding ongoing social processes, regardless of the subject. Even if we were to limit ‘youth’ to the ages of 15-29, this group would still comprise a quarter of the Arctic’s total population. Also, not only is it the strongest predictive group for long-term demographic, mobility and labour trends, but it is also the section of the population in which Indigeneity, gender, geography and opportunity structures intersect in by far the most visible way. And who knows more about such things than those currently experiencing them?
This focus is especially relevant considering the glacial pace at which policy can react to reality. Ten years of engagement, research, deliberation and, finally, policy implementation can feel like the blink of an eye. But to a person just finishing school, such a span of time can easily determine the rest of their life.
The importance of centring policy around youth when it comes to long-term sustainability makes the inherent value of their engagement so readily obvious. As mentioned previously, this value must be reflected in the allocation of resources and direct compensation to the stakeholders with whom one needs to collaborate.
- Published on
Isabel Louise Cadec. Photo: Victoria Cadec
Isabel Louise Cadec’s Discussion Reflection
Shaping Trails and Futures
We have the pleasure and honour of publishing a reflection on the discussion delivered at the Arctic Frontiers conference. The conference was held in February 2026 in Tromsø, Norway. The discussion was part of the panel session organised by the CAP-SHARE project, entitled Intergenerational Capacity Sharing: The Connection Between Nature and Youth.
The text was originally written in English.
Discussion Reflection:
Shaping Trails and Futures
Isabel Louise Cadec
Project Coordinator, The Þórsmörk Trail Volunteers, Land and Forest Iceland
It was a privilege to not only attend the Arctic Frontiers conference earlier this year, but to be invited by the CAP-SHARE project to participate as a panellist representing Iceland in a discussion about capacity sharing and biodiversity on 6 February 2026. Although I am not from Iceland myself, I have spent the last six years immersed in the Icelandic Highlands, leading groups of international volunteers in landscape restoration and hiking trail construction through sustainable approaches. This is with a project called The Þórsmörk Trail Volunteers, which is coordinated by Land og Skógur. I am grateful to have had the opportunity to discuss my experiences as a trail builder who works alongside groups of young people from across the world, including Taiwan, Canada, Finland, and Norway, to name but a few countries.
I thrive and feel most at home in the birch forest of Þórsmörk and Goðaland, a nature reserve in South Iceland, where I continually have soil-covered hands, grass-stained trousers, muddy boots, and windswept hair. I welcome the disconnection and stillness of the Icelandic Highlands. Smart business wear and public speaking are certainly out of my comfort zone, and I would be lying if I said I was not nervous in the minutes leading up to the panel discussion. However, I am enthusiastic and passionate about building trails, restoring Þórsmörk and Goðaland, and teaching our young volunteers about these strategies in a changing environment. Thus, despite the nerves, there was an undercurrent of excitement to be able to discuss a topic I deeply care about.
Early in the discussion, the panel was asked:
How do you relate to land and water - such as rivers, lakes, coasts, tundra, forests, or fells - and how do these relationships shape your identity and sense of the future?
As I listened to my fellow panellists, I was moved by the different stories and experiences they shared about land and place. When it was my turn to speak, I realised that the question was not asking for a single kind of connection, but opening space for different relationships, histories, and experiences to be expressed.
Our volunteer camp in Þórsmörk is basic. This has always been the intention. We are now going into our 15th year of this project, but at the very beginning there was nothing but a dusty scrap of land where our camp is situated. Over the years, our camp has been slowly built with low impact, sustainability and the landscape in mind. Our camp features turf roofs which now have small birch trees growing on them, and our huts are constructed with Icelandic grown timber. A colleague even referred to our camp as a hobbit village.
In the panel discussion, I explained how a significant part of this development has been about nurturing the forest in and round our camp. We have taken a lot of care to plant, relocate and nurture the native birch and willow. With this, the nature and wildlife are much closer to our door. Addressing the audience, I tried to paint the image that shows how we have fostered and created a camp that is part of the landscape and forest.
My relationship to this land, which has shaped my identity, has not come from being born into an Arctic country like my fellow panellists. I grew up on the sunny, populated south coast of England. Instead, my connection and relation to the land have developed over time, mediated through our basic camp lifestyle and passing on knowledge, inspiration, and passion, whilst creating a space for learning and escapism from our busy lives. I call this “the Þórsmörk bubble”. It has become a place to temporarily escape whatever concerns, worries, or stresses our volunteers have, through reconnecting with the land and nature. This is what I would like to continue in the future – not just a trail maintenance programme, but rather a place nestled in the Icelandic forests, rivers and mountains where people can come for a short while to disconnect, learn something new, reconnect with nature, and contribute something good to the landscape.
I was then directly asked:
How do you experience young people’s opportunities to influence biodiversity protection and environmental decision making in your community? What barriers exist?
For this, I had prepared some photographs to help illustrate a very small part of what our volunteers are involved with when they join our project. In Iceland, the term ‘youth’ encompasses people aged six to 25. Most of our volunteers are aged 20–25.
Shaping Trails and Futures
We have the pleasure and honour of publishing a reflection on the discussion delivered at the Arctic Frontiers conference. The conference was held in February 2026 in Tromsø, Norway. The discussion was part of the panel session organised by the CAP-SHARE project, entitled Intergenerational Capacity Sharing: The Connection Between Nature and Youth.
The text was originally written in English.
Discussion Reflection:
Shaping Trails and Futures
Isabel Louise Cadec
Project Coordinator, The Þórsmörk Trail Volunteers, Land and Forest Iceland
It was a privilege to not only attend the Arctic Frontiers conference earlier this year, but to be invited by the CAP-SHARE project to participate as a panellist representing Iceland in a discussion about capacity sharing and biodiversity on 6 February 2026. Although I am not from Iceland myself, I have spent the last six years immersed in the Icelandic Highlands, leading groups of international volunteers in landscape restoration and hiking trail construction through sustainable approaches. This is with a project called The Þórsmörk Trail Volunteers, which is coordinated by Land og Skógur. I am grateful to have had the opportunity to discuss my experiences as a trail builder who works alongside groups of young people from across the world, including Taiwan, Canada, Finland, and Norway, to name but a few countries.
I thrive and feel most at home in the birch forest of Þórsmörk and Goðaland, a nature reserve in South Iceland, where I continually have soil-covered hands, grass-stained trousers, muddy boots, and windswept hair. I welcome the disconnection and stillness of the Icelandic Highlands. Smart business wear and public speaking are certainly out of my comfort zone, and I would be lying if I said I was not nervous in the minutes leading up to the panel discussion. However, I am enthusiastic and passionate about building trails, restoring Þórsmörk and Goðaland, and teaching our young volunteers about these strategies in a changing environment. Thus, despite the nerves, there was an undercurrent of excitement to be able to discuss a topic I deeply care about.
Early in the discussion, the panel was asked:
How do you relate to land and water - such as rivers, lakes, coasts, tundra, forests, or fells - and how do these relationships shape your identity and sense of the future?
As I listened to my fellow panellists, I was moved by the different stories and experiences they shared about land and place. When it was my turn to speak, I realised that the question was not asking for a single kind of connection, but opening space for different relationships, histories, and experiences to be expressed.
Our volunteer camp in Þórsmörk is basic. This has always been the intention. We are now going into our 15th year of this project, but at the very beginning there was nothing but a dusty scrap of land where our camp is situated. Over the years, our camp has been slowly built with low impact, sustainability and the landscape in mind. Our camp features turf roofs which now have small birch trees growing on them, and our huts are constructed with Icelandic grown timber. A colleague even referred to our camp as a hobbit village.
In the panel discussion, I explained how a significant part of this development has been about nurturing the forest in and round our camp. We have taken a lot of care to plant, relocate and nurture the native birch and willow. With this, the nature and wildlife are much closer to our door. Addressing the audience, I tried to paint the image that shows how we have fostered and created a camp that is part of the landscape and forest.
My relationship to this land, which has shaped my identity, has not come from being born into an Arctic country like my fellow panellists. I grew up on the sunny, populated south coast of England. Instead, my connection and relation to the land have developed over time, mediated through our basic camp lifestyle and passing on knowledge, inspiration, and passion, whilst creating a space for learning and escapism from our busy lives. I call this “the Þórsmörk bubble”. It has become a place to temporarily escape whatever concerns, worries, or stresses our volunteers have, through reconnecting with the land and nature. This is what I would like to continue in the future – not just a trail maintenance programme, but rather a place nestled in the Icelandic forests, rivers and mountains where people can come for a short while to disconnect, learn something new, reconnect with nature, and contribute something good to the landscape.
I was then directly asked:
How do you experience young people’s opportunities to influence biodiversity protection and environmental decision making in your community? What barriers exist?
For this, I had prepared some photographs to help illustrate a very small part of what our volunteers are involved with when they join our project. In Iceland, the term ‘youth’ encompasses people aged six to 25. Most of our volunteers are aged 20–25.
Photo collage: Þórsmörk trail projects and the volunteer camp. Photo 1: Hreinn Óskarsson, photo 2: Chas Goemans, other photos: Isabel Louise Cadec.
We are an entry level programme, a stepping stone for young people in their early career development. An opportunity for them to learn about biodiversity protection and restoration in a different capacity. However, what exactly does biodiversity protection look like in relation to trail management, and how are these two elements linked? Trails are an essential infrastructure for our access into these nature destinations, to national parks, to protected areas, to semi-wilderness places. Yet, a poorly maintained trail is bad news for the plant biodiversity surrounding that trail.
Many areas of Þórsmörk feature fragile moss communities and slow growing flora. Biodiversity in Iceland is characterised by wide interspecies diversity. When answering this question, I explained how the moss species in Iceland are extremely vulnerable and take a long time to recover if trampled by hikers. This then exposes the soil beneath, which leads to continual soil erosion if this cycle of off-trail trampling is not fixed. It creates an ugly scar in the landscape.
This is where trail maintenance comes in. Well-maintained trails protect our vegetation biodiversity, because people walk on the trails and not on the moss. The slide I presented in the panel discussion shows what happens when the trails do not receive the continual support and maintenance required (photo 1). Photo 2 shows The Þórsmörk Trail Volunteers efforts in restoring this same section of trail. It gives the plants the opportunity to grow again.
I would also briefly like to point out the importance of community engagement in our trail maintenance strategy. This is illustrated in photos 6 and 7, a before and after look from 2025. At first glance, it is just another trail. However, the story behind it is grounded in a regenerative tourism approach based on community, stakeholder, and user engagement in our trail network development for both tourism and local use. Hiking guides who operate in the area worked with us to restore this section of trail, while we simultaneously cooperated with the local mountain biking community to develop an alternative route for keen bikers in the area.
In answer to this question, I hope it clarified for the audience that trail maintenance and its impacts go beyond just a one-metre path. Restoration and trail development are strengthened with community engagement and young people’s opportunities to learn about the diversity in biodiversity protection methods. As for barriers, we strongly believe in free volunteering to make these experiences and learning opportunities more accessible to a wider audience of young people. I for one was inspired after joining The Þórsmörk Trails Volunteers as a volunteer myself in 2020. Six years on and I am still in the valley of Þórsmörk and Goðaland, hopefully inspiring the next young graduates.
The final question was addressed to everyone in the panel:
What does a hopeful, just and resilient Arctic future look like from your perspective?
For me, I believe it is one that strongly recognises and acts on the understanding that we are part of nature, not apart from it – an Arctic region that actively responds to the environmental and societal concerns of everyone who lives in the Arctic, not just passively listens. We are all connected in this wider Arctic, and if we can all play our part to be inclusive, respectful, and environmentally conscious, that will lead to a more hopeful future.
I would also like to see improved youth mobility. An Arctic that promotes more environmental programmes which offer holistic training and mentoring for capacity sharing in a way that is accessible and financially viable for youth. After all, this is what influenced my own life, and I am all the more thankful for it.
Many areas of Þórsmörk feature fragile moss communities and slow growing flora. Biodiversity in Iceland is characterised by wide interspecies diversity. When answering this question, I explained how the moss species in Iceland are extremely vulnerable and take a long time to recover if trampled by hikers. This then exposes the soil beneath, which leads to continual soil erosion if this cycle of off-trail trampling is not fixed. It creates an ugly scar in the landscape.
This is where trail maintenance comes in. Well-maintained trails protect our vegetation biodiversity, because people walk on the trails and not on the moss. The slide I presented in the panel discussion shows what happens when the trails do not receive the continual support and maintenance required (photo 1). Photo 2 shows The Þórsmörk Trail Volunteers efforts in restoring this same section of trail. It gives the plants the opportunity to grow again.
I would also briefly like to point out the importance of community engagement in our trail maintenance strategy. This is illustrated in photos 6 and 7, a before and after look from 2025. At first glance, it is just another trail. However, the story behind it is grounded in a regenerative tourism approach based on community, stakeholder, and user engagement in our trail network development for both tourism and local use. Hiking guides who operate in the area worked with us to restore this section of trail, while we simultaneously cooperated with the local mountain biking community to develop an alternative route for keen bikers in the area.
In answer to this question, I hope it clarified for the audience that trail maintenance and its impacts go beyond just a one-metre path. Restoration and trail development are strengthened with community engagement and young people’s opportunities to learn about the diversity in biodiversity protection methods. As for barriers, we strongly believe in free volunteering to make these experiences and learning opportunities more accessible to a wider audience of young people. I for one was inspired after joining The Þórsmörk Trails Volunteers as a volunteer myself in 2020. Six years on and I am still in the valley of Þórsmörk and Goðaland, hopefully inspiring the next young graduates.
The final question was addressed to everyone in the panel:
What does a hopeful, just and resilient Arctic future look like from your perspective?
For me, I believe it is one that strongly recognises and acts on the understanding that we are part of nature, not apart from it – an Arctic region that actively responds to the environmental and societal concerns of everyone who lives in the Arctic, not just passively listens. We are all connected in this wider Arctic, and if we can all play our part to be inclusive, respectful, and environmentally conscious, that will lead to a more hopeful future.
I would also like to see improved youth mobility. An Arctic that promotes more environmental programmes which offer holistic training and mentoring for capacity sharing in a way that is accessible and financially viable for youth. After all, this is what influenced my own life, and I am all the more thankful for it.