Behind every greenhouse built and every business plan drafted under Green Pro in South Lampung, there is a quieter story unfolding, one about young people rediscovering their own capacity to lead, speak, and belong. These are four of them.
Bayu: Learning That Change Starts with Showing Up
For Bayu Aji Santosa, a young man from Totoharjo Village, environmental issues once felt distant — someone else’s responsibility, not something a village youth like him could touch. Jobs were scarce, the local economy felt stagnant, and even the weather had grown harder to predict. It left him with a quiet, growing unease: how long could the village keep going like this?
That began to shift when Green Pro arrived in his village. At first, Bayu simply listened. But the more Focus Group Discussions he attended — hearing from livestock farmers, young growers, local food processors, and tourism advocates — the more his thinking opened up. He began asking questions, first only privately to facilitators, then more openly. Eventually, he made a small but significant decision: he signed up as a Green Pro volunteer.
That decision hasn’t yet produced a business or an income. But it changed how Bayu sees his own role — from someone waiting for opportunity to someone shaping it. “I haven’t changed the system,” he reflects, “but I’ve changed the direction of my own life.” For a green economy to take root in Totoharjo, it will need more young people willing to make that same first move.
Ery: Redefining What It Means to Have a Disability
Before 2020, Ery — full name Moh. Ery Syarif — had a steady job, a young marriage, and a future he thought he understood. A motorcycle accident with his wife changed all of that. His leg was amputated, and he returned to Totoharjo Village unable to continue his factory work, adjusting to a prosthetic limb and, for a time, to a deep sense of loss.
“In the beginning, I often felt inferior,” Ery recalls. He rarely left the house. Slowly, he started a small computer repair service and took on work at the village office — modest steps back into the world.
The larger shift came when Ery joined Green Pro as a volunteer, taking part in a Knowledge, Attitudes, and Practice (KAP) survey of young people in his village. Before going into the field, volunteers were trained not only in data collection but in how to interact respectfully with people with disabilities. Ery had expected it to be a formality. Instead, it changed how he saw himself.
“I realised that people with disabilities aren’t people to be pitied. They have potential, knowledge, and dreams too — just under different circumstances.” Interviewing other young people about their own ambitions, Ery came to a conclusion that has stayed with him: even when the body faces limitations, the mind can carry a person forward. Today, he no longer sees himself as someone who is “less” — but as someone still in progress. Having a disability, he says, wasn’t the end of his story. It was the beginning of a new way of seeing life.
Cut: Choosing to Speak
Cut Zakiyatul Himmah joined Kunjir Village’s Community Information Group (KIM) in 2023 — not out of ambition, but because a friend was going too. In those early days, Cut was known for staying quiet in meetings: eyes down, avoiding questions, finding reasons to stay busy with her phone rather than speak up.
Over time, though, staying involved changed her. She met more people, absorbed more perspectives than she’d been used to, and slowly noticed that her ideas were being heard — sometimes even shaping the group’s decisions. The change showed on the outside too, in small, steady ways.
When Green Pro arrived in Kunjir, Cut volunteered without hesitation, treating it as a deliberate choice to keep growing. Through trainings and village-level discussions, her confidence kept building — until, during one Focus Group Discussion, faced with the task of presenting her team’s findings, she took a breath and said: “I’ll do the presentation.”
It was a small sentence with a large meaning. Cut’s journey is a reminder that courage isn’t something people either have or lack — it’s something built, one opportunity at a time.
Novita: Finding Her Way Back
When Novita Indah Sari returned to Kunjir Village in early 2026 to care for her ailing mother, she expected to feel at home. Instead, after years away, she felt like a stranger. “I felt like a stranger to the atmosphere, and to the people too,” she recalls.
It was a sharp contrast to who she’d once been — an active student council president, often trusted to host village events. Marriage and family responsibilities had gradually pulled her away from public life, and with that distance, her confidence had quietly faded.
Green Pro became her way back in. She started simply, as a respondent in a KAP survey, before joining the village marketing group and attending meetings regularly. Along the way, she was entrusted to lead Security and Safety Briefings and share messages on Protection from Sexual Exploitation, Abuse, and Harassment (PSEAH) — small responsibilities that became a space to relearn how to speak in front of others.
“I just want to feel confident like I used to — to be brave enough to speak in front of people again,” she says. The warmth of the group did the rest: younger members began affectionately calling her “Mami Vita,” a nickname that reflects the sense of belonging she rebuilt through the process.
Novita still hopes to sell her products online one day. But for her, the real achievement has already happened — the courage to show up, speak, and take a role in her community once again. “Every gathering brings something meaningful,” she says. “It’s never just a meeting.”
Bayu, Ery, Cut, and Novita are among the young people building South Lampung’s green economy, one small decision at a time — proof that the most lasting change often starts with someone simply choosing to show up.
