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by Lal Hewapathirana , Director, Worldview Sri Lanka

Sri Lanka is not the only country plagued with the problem of youth employment. Asian Region itself is worse. African continent is still worse.

The fact that some much fortunate countries in other parts of the world are endowed with riches, like oil and various other natural resources, does not by any means indicate that their youth are happily employed. Although much belated, a global intervention to seek solutions to this escalating issue of youth is now under way in the form of a Youth Employment Summit (YES), which will be held from September 7-11 in Alexandria, Egypt. The summit is the result of some hard work, strenuous efforts and excellent planning by a group of eminent leaders and youth from several developed and developing countries of the world.

YES will be focussing on the following six major areas with the view to finding sustainable solutions indiscriminately to the global youth employment issues.

* Drawing world attention to the crisis and the opportunities of youth employment, as the preliminary step towards launching of the YES Global Alliance for Youth Employment.

* Generation of 500 million sustainable employment opportunities by the year 2012 through the launching of a Decade Campaign of Action.

* Adoption of YES Framework of Action to guide the Decade Campaign of Action.

* Presenting to the global community the concept of YES Global Knowledge Resource highlighting successful policies and sound practices, showcasing innovative and promising strategies, spurring collaborative action, and serving as a catalyst for raising awareness and building momentum - all in the search of avenues to soften the impact of the crisis.

* Cooperating with over 70 YES Country Networks that support community outreach through information hubs and many other media and communication channels to mobilise the participation of grassroots level youth.

* Harnessing the potential of new technologies to provide a virtual forum for youth employment.

In the performance of its gigantic task, YES is supported by a host of key global institutions including World Bank. UNDP and some of its agencies, Commonwealth Secretariat, The Earth Council, International Youth Federation, Deutsche Bank, Organisation of American States, International Business Leaders Forum, CIDA, SIDA, Organisation of Economic Cooperation and Development, and the Harvard University Center for International Development. In addition, more than 1,000 members of the YES Global Alliance comprising Governments, Inter Governmental Agencies, NGOs, Civil Society, Youth Organisations, Private Sector, Donor Agencies, and Mass Media are currently active within the YES Framework for Action to support youth employment at local, national, regional and global levels.

For Sri Lanka, the YES Secretariat has recognised Worldview Sri Lanka (WSL) as the local focal point, to launch a campaign of information, education and communication among particularly the youth of the country to enable them to participate in the YES through many different formats. They will be most welcome to physically participate in the Summit, share their experiences, bring back new knowledge and help Sri Lanka's efforts in reaching the YES goals locally. For those unable to attend the YES, WSL will launch a participatory communication campaign which would provide opportunities for the youth in the peripheral areas of the country to subscribe their experiences and points of view in terms of the YES aims and objectives.

WSL will also mobilise youth organisations and NGOs at grass roots levels to hold dialogues amongst there members, young and elderly, to draft guidelines on meeting the challenges in regard to youth employment in Sri Lanka. All these findings and conclusions will be tabled at the YES for further deliberation.

Charith Missaka Wijesinghe, the YES Coordinator in Worldview Sri Lanka in explaining the importance of Sri Lanka's contribution to the Summit said, "This again is the result of the globalisation process, which we cannot escape. Youth employment is not an issue for us in Sri Lanka, but a global issue. So, naturally we are a body caught in the web. That explains the role we have to play in finding sustainable solutions to the issue, not merely by ourselves, but hand in hand with the global community. Hence the significance of the YES to all of us, the youth in Sri Lanka. We hope to voice the concerns of the Sri Lankan youth at the Summit, and enrich the YES dialogue so that its vision and the mission would achieve the desired success."

The vision of the Summit becomes an absolutely commendable innovation benefitting developing countries like ours, when analysing the State of World Population 1998 Report of the UNFPA, which states that more than one billion jobs need to be created before 2010 to accommodate young workers entering the labour force and thus reduce unemployment. This will remain a reality for the entirety of the current decade, as out of the one billion youth in the world, 850 million live in developing countries at present.

Aged between 15 and 29, they live with the hope that very soon they will be meeting the challenge of securing employment that would generate productive work comparable with those in the industrialised countries. Especially in the less industrialised countries, it is widely-known that destructive social unrest and tension among the youth are mainly due to increasing levels of unemployment and under employment resulting in the breakdown of living standards.

In the above background, it is highly laudable that the YES is determined to conceptualise and launch several plans of action in order to achieve its ambitious goals. The summit participants will accordingly address nine specific themes at nine different sessions and produce feasible action plans that would hopefully meet with the needs to promote youth employment.

The nine themes relate to Government Policy, Private Sector, Rural Development, Financing Youth Employment, Information Communication and Technology, Entrepreneurship, Education for Work, Transition to Work, and Youth Employment and Sustainable Development. Each session will be chaired by a member of the YES Organising Committee, and co-chaired by two eminent resource persons selected from the field concerned. The session background papers will be developed by selected specialists on the specific theme.

Kshitij Joshi, Director of Worldview International Foundation's Mandate the Future Project, who is a youth advisor in the Organising Committee of the Summit states that YES will be different from the usual summit formats. He says, "This is a working Summit at which all participants will contribute their knowledge, experiences and other resources to develop bold action plans, all directed towards the goal of meeting challenges of youth employment. Never before has the voice of the youth earned so much respect and acceptability as now in all countries of the world. YES will explore this advantage to the full and collaborate with the youth of the world in the process of decision-making on youth employment issues."

"The summit will be attended by over 2,000 participants representing diverse fields, and at least half of them will be the youth. The two fora planned for the participants are the Civil Society Forum at which diverse fields will be represented, and the Ministerial Forum meant for representatives from over 100 Governments," states Summit Director Poonam Ahluwalia. Explaining the Summit further, she says, "Holding the Summit is not our ultimate goal. YES will be an opportunity for getting organised, solidifying partnerships, seeking media attention and alignments, creating public awareness, and placing the burning issue of youth unemployment on the global agenda."

Summit Director, while inviting the youth to participate in the YES states, "We invite you to join in this exciting process. Your participation will make the critical difference needed over the next 10 years, as you will mark an important time in history when the plight of unemployed youth will be given attention on the world stage to tackle head-on the challenge of youth unemployment."

Youth desirous of participating in the YES could obtain any further information and guidelines for registration by visiting the website www.youthemploymentsummit.org or communicating through e-mails - [email protected] or [email protected]. The local focal point address is Worldview Sri Lanka, 713, D. P. Wijesinghe Mawatha, Pelawatte, Battaramulla.

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Copyright 2001 The Associated Newspapers of Ceylon Ltd.
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