Young people living, studying or working in Ecuador’s seven Biosphere Reserves can apply for seed funding to consolidate and grow projects for nature, under the third edition of Semilla Joven: Acción por la Biodiversidad. The call opened on 5 August 2026 and closes on 31 August 2026, with grantees announced in September.

Semilla Joven was created by UNESCO and CONDESAN and launched in 2025, when more than 115 young people applied from Biosphere Reserves across the country. A second edition followed in January 2026, focused on strengthening projects with high potential and selecting one initiative per reserve.

What is new in this edition is the alignment. The fund is now tied to Ecuador’s National Biodiversity Strategy and to the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework, and two new strategic allies have joined: USFQ and the NBSAP Accelerator Partnership, the latter driven by the Ministry of Environment and Energy through the Global Programme on Nature for Development. The design connects youth, local knowledge and territorial action to national implementation, and shows how the Man and the Biosphere Programme and the Global Biodiversity Framework can work together.

Applicants are aged 18 to 35 and must already have a project underway in one of three areas: conservation, sustainable use, agrobiodiversity and bioentrepreneurship; innovation, open science and applied research; or participatory biodiversity governance and community and youth inclusion. Proposals that recover traditional knowledge through intergenerational exchange are given additional weight.

One winner per reserve receives US$1,250 for a project lasting a maximum of two months. Beyond the financing, grantees receive technical support from UNESCO, CONDESAN, the NBSAP Accelerator Partnership and USFQ. The winners of all three editions will come together at an exchange fair at the USFQ Cumbayá campus, creating a network across the reserves.