Productive Engagement of Youth in Fulfilling the

Millennium Development Goals

The YES Experience!

June 23, 2004

Dr. Puneetha Sagar Palakurthi

Research and Development Coordinator

Youth Employment Summit Campaign

The Youth Employment Challenge

Consider this:

• There are a billion youth between the ages of 15- 24

• 850 million of them live in developing countries.

• Another 1.5 billion are behind them in school systems

• About 10 million young people aged between 10 and 24 years are infected with AIDS.

• Approximately 130 million youth live on less than a dollar a day.

Other challenges:

• No clear structures for youth participation in policy formation and program design

• Youth employment is still not a compelling issue on the global agenda

• Lack of resources and the will to support young people in their efforts

• Lack of information on youth employment.

Cost of exclusion!

• .. are too high! We’ve seen it over and over again!

• Failure to include and engage young people = a prescription for disaster!

The choices are clear...

Alexandria Youth Employment Summit

Launched a Decade Campaign for Youth Employment

Engaged youth as equal partners

Built the commitment of leaders

Shared the knowledge base on ‘what works’

Made a call for Action!

“More than one billion jobs need to be created between now and 2010 to accommodate

young workers entering the labor force and reduce unemployment”

- UNFPA State of the World Population Report 1998

The Alexandria Youth Employment Summit

Co chairs: H.E Mrs. Suzanne Mubarak

President Hon. William J. ClintonBibliotheca Alexandrina,

Alexandria, EgyptSeptember 7-11, 2002

Alexandria SummitCivil Society Forum

All sessions supported by background papers

Capacity Building Workshops

Building partnerships

1600 delegates - 120 countries

Fifty percent youth delegates

A meeting for 60 YES Country Networks

Ministerial Forum (10-11 Sept. 2002)

Over 70 government delegations 45 led by Ministers

Developed and adopted the Alexandria Declaration

Committed to collaborate with YES Country Networks

Pledged to work to achieve the goals of the YES Campaign

The Alexandria Declaration6Es

• Employment Creation

• Employability

• Equity

• Entrepreneurship

• Environmental Sustainability

• Empowerment

What works?

We know the winning options...

CreativitySupport

Voice

Productivity

PlatformHope

‘What Works’• Recognizing young people as assets• Harnessing their creativity and innovation • Paying attention to their ideas and

offering opportunities to learn by doing• Offering a non-judgmental space for

experimenting• Mentoring and coaching

YES Country Networks

• Multi-stakeholder networks focusing on youth employment

• Youth driven: vanguard of the YES Campaign

• Committed to Action• Raising awareness and

resources locally to address the youth employment challenge.

YES Networks: platform for youth participation and agenda setting

• In preparation for Alexandria YES Networks organized over 50 consultations

• Placed youth employment on the development agenda of their countries

Building the Capacity of Youth

Not enough to demand that youth be consulted in framing policies and developing programs

Essential to provide them the opportunity to learn about ‘what works’ and ‘what’s missing’

The Importance of gap analysis - SIDA/YES project for engaging youth as leaders for employment

Creating an infrastructure for youth participation

Building on existing National Youth Councils, Youth Commissions and other youth focused organizations are

the

YES Country Networks!

...building the coalitions for youth employment

Governments, NGOs, Academic Institutions, Employers, Trade Unions, and other stakeholders

Opportunity to meet with the ministers!

At YES2002, Youth Delegates had the opportunity to meet with Ministers from their countries and build relationships

Impact of such Opportunities

YES Mozambique Met with their Minister at YES2002, presented action

plan upon return, Ministry adopted the plan as a program and policy item

YES Gambia Met with their Minister at YES2002, upon return

launched a joint program with the government to create 100,000 sustainable livelihoods during the YES Decade Campaign

Impact of such Opportunities

YES ParaguayMet with their Minister throughout 2002 in preparation

for the Summit, invited local governments and authorities to YES Network meetings, engaged national

government and hosted discussion for presidential candidates on youth employment as a campaign and

policy matter

Many more stories. See monthly YES Insider

YES Model of Youth Engagement

Respect: An enabling environment of transparency, opportunity, dialogue and respect needs to be created in all communications with young people

Tools: Developing the tools, working intensely and closely, and providing incentives are fundamental to facilitate genuine youth participation

Trust: The most important ingredient in the recipe for youth engagement

“Working with youth for youth”

Skills Development

The YES Academy

YES Academy

Building the Capacity of

YES Networks:• Leadership

development• Project planning and

implementation• Understanding Policy • Learning “what works”• Establishing effective

partnerships

Skills Development

Two broad classifications on skills development:

1. Technical Skills: vocational training, formal education etc

2. Life skills: problem solving, negotiation, leadership development, consensus building etc

Skills Development:YES Networks take the lead..

YES Pakistan has launched a YES Skills Development Center for orphans to meet this need

What’s next?

Working in collaboration with you in ensuring the success of the YES Campaign

A WARM INVITATION TO ALL OF YOU TO THE YES MEXICO 2004

October 4 – 7, 2004 in Veracruz, Mexico

Closing thought...

“Never doubt that a small group of committed people can change the world, indeed nothing else ever has”

- Margaret Meade

THANK YOUwww.yesweb.org