Volunteering for post-2015

NEWSLETTER 3 | MAY 2013

Young people in all countries are both a major The United Nations Volunteers (UNV) programme has human resource for development and key been promoting the role of youth in development since agents for social change, economic develop1976. Through his Five-Year Action Agenda the UN Secment and technological innovation. retary-General Ban Ki-moon called on UNV to create a specific youth volunteers programme. Since then, UNV Your generation is already making a mark has been working closely with youth-led organizations, on history, from politics to social media. civil society organizations, the UN Inter-Agency Network on Youth Development and others to develop a multisaid Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on Febfaceted programme, which is expected to be launched ruary 20, 2013.The SG Youth Action plan remid-2013. A dedicated trust fund has also been set up by flects the awareness that youth are among the UNDP and UNV. Member States from around the world most vulnerable of all persons tackled by the have expressed their interest in the programme during eight Millennium Development Goals but at the the recent Briefing on the Five-year Action Agenda to same time, the greatest resource towards their ECOSOC in New York. The UNV global youth programme achievement. Their participation and inclusion will contribute to the facilitation of youth participation in shaping the new sustainable development and voice in peace and sustainable development progoals are crucial to ensure the success of the grammes through volunteering, towards realization of their full social, economic and human potential, as also MDGs successor framework. commented by Mr. Ahmad Al Hindawi during his latest Civil Society and visit to UNV HQ, on May 9. For two decades young people tried to catch up youth-led organizations are calling for a with the MDGs that were set up by experts and bottom-up process to diplomats. Now it is different: we are going to ensure that young peoples voices are have a new development framework for the whole included in the new globe. In this sense, it is like writing a constitution. agenda.
If we are world citizens, then this is our constitution for development and we are practicing our right to shape the development framework that will lead this globe for the coming 15 years. Ahmad Al Hindawi, UN Secretary-General Envoy for Youth on his views about the post-2015. Source My World Blog

NEWS FROM THE GLOBAL UNV YOUTH VOLUNTEER PROGRAMME

Youth in the post - 2015 agenda

The post-2015 process must include youth as stakeholders, since they crucially strengthen legitimacy, momentum and awareness for the new agenda that, at its core, is about securing their future.

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Volunteering for post-2015

Post - 2015 Voices from the field

Merel, Volunteer for post - 2015: Bangladesh

In 2012, UNV has assigned 966 volunteers under the age of 30

We decided to focus on young working with different agenpeople, since youth represent UNRCO and UNV were already thinking about one-third of the population of cies, projects and missions. Bangladesh. With support of ways to increase participation to the My UN Online Volunteers, the surWorld survey. I joined the discussion addressvey was translated into Bangla. Other UN agencies and NGOs supported the initiative by ing many questions: Can we translate the surdistributing the offline survey among young people without vey into Bangla? How do we reach out to the internet access and promoting the online survey among their networks. rural and urban poor? And most importantly: Within a week, over 40 people from across the world responded to the online volunteer opportunity. Within whom do we want to target? three weeks we translated the survey, and distributed nearly 10,000 copies among participating organizations. To me it is really inspiring to see volunteers from Colombia, the USA, DRC, Czech Republic, India, Australia and of course Bangladesh commit their time and energy to turn My World into a youth success in Bangladesh. Last but not least, of course, is the active interest of UN agencies, NGOs and local volunteers in administering the surveys who are the driving force of My World in Bangladesh. By May 10 th we will receive the results and enter the offline roll outs data into the global survey. The results will also be published to show youths development priorities in Bangladesh. Merel Fuchs, UNV, international post-2015 volunteer, merel.fuchs@undp.org As I joined the UNV Field Unit in Bangladesh, UNV is a partner of MYWorld. You can use the UNV partner website for online voting: http://www.myworld2015.org/?partner=UNV

Amita , Volunteer for post - 2015: India

The UNV Field Unit in India has reached out to thousands of Indians to engage them in the post -2015 process through the MYWorld Offline Survey. Since March, more than 1,200 offline votes have been submitted from the states of Karnataka and Kerala in the south, Assam in the east and Maharashtra in the west. In Karnataka, the students of Social Work of BSW College run by the Belgaum Integrated Rural Development Society translated the survey in the local dialect, Kannada, and reached out to more than 1,000 indigenous, marginalized people and poor households in Belgaums remote areas. In April, about 30 school principals and teachers participated in the offline roll out in the city of Mumbai during the launch of the Youth Empowerment Mission, which is a campaign organized to create channels of youth engagement through volunteering. Participants enthusiastically voted, and pledged to mobilize over 10,000 students and communities in rural and urban areas around Mumbai.
Youth taking the offline Survey in Assam

Amita Dahiya, UNV, post-2015 National Coordinator amita.dahiya@undp.org

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initiatives for development from around (OUR) World

WAGGGS, World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts, is engaged in numerous groups and alliances that work on developing the successor framework for MDGs. Capitalizing on its resources and its role as the largest volunteer movement dedicated to girls and young women in the world, WAGGGS wants to make sure the voices of girls and young women are taken into account in the post-2015 development framework. To address this concern, WAGGGS launched the campaign The World we want for Girls and established a pool of young women from 16 countries to be ambassadors on the future development agenda, to ensure that it takes into account the priorities of girls and young women. WAGGGS supports its Member Organizations at national and regional level, to engage in events and lobbying opportunities on post-2015. WAGGGS members engaged in High-level Panel consultations and other UN-led and civil society- led initiatives with youth in particular. The young ambassadors are also contributing to the promotion of the MYWorld survey and coordinating the offline roll out For further information, contact Anush Aghabalyan Anush@wagggsworld.org The International Youth Council (IYC) has launched a post-MDG tool-kit on water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH). The toolkit, based on material originally produced by WaterAid, has been developed to support IYC and their youth affiliations in carrying out advocacy around the post-2015 framework. Youth WASH Ambassadors are concerned with making sure every young person has the opportunity to take part in shaping the future of WASH. It is crucial to raise awareness about the importance of these vital services, mobilize young people to work together, and build their capacity to lobby for WASH in the post -2015 framework and beyond. You can download the Post-MDGs toolkit by following the link: http:// internationalyouthcouncil.com/page/post-mdgtoolkit

Bake the world a better place

This initiative explores how marketing and advertising techniques can be used to raise awareness about development issues. The chefs of this initiative are a consortium of five NGOs working together in a European cross-border project. By creating new recipes, they open development education to new tasters! They identified a target group, usually not reached by development education: Young Modern Performers (YMP). For over two years, Bake the world a better place carried out 25 actions aimed at reaching mainstream European youth in order to make them aware of the MDGs. These can be very simple things that [young people] can change in their everyday habits. There are many interdependencies between everyday personal lifestyles at home and development topics. Thinking global involves acting local! Find out more : http://www.bakeabetterplace.org/

Restless Development is a youth-led development agency. Their mission is to

place young people at the forefront of change and development. Their strength comes from being led by young professionals, from the boardroom right through to the field. They have been working hard since 1985, and over the past 27 years their programs have reached over seven million young people. With input from partners in 12 countries and with support from the Department for International Development youth working group, Restless Development launched a toolkit for post-2015 youth consultations, meant to enable youth groups across the world to run consultation workshops on youth priorities for a post 2015 development framework. The results were captured in a report and a dissemination guide was designed to provide guidance on how to share the findings with key influencers in the post -2015 process in different national and local contexts. The guide is packed full of useful tips and ideas on how to develop the key elements of a good post -2015 dissemination strategy.

Leveraging Egyptian

voices

Egypt possesses a large youth population:18 -29-year-olds make up one quarter of the total population ( Egypt Human Development Report 2010, UNDP and Institute of National Planning, Egypt, 2010 ). This substantial human capital remains largely untapped. Many young people are excluded and disengaged from the development of their communities. Therefore, youth, as a diverse category, represented a target group for the Post 2015 Development consultations that took place in Egypt. Over 20 participants, representing NGO affiliates, university and technical We might be consulted, but our opin- school students attended the national consultation in March 2013. The consultation ensured the participation of the voiceless and marginalized youth including ion is not included in the decision youth from rural areas, women, national CSOs and informal youth groups. Almost making. Anonymous during the National Consultahalf of the participants came from the governorates of Fayoum, Qena, Minya and tion in Egypt Beni Suef. To youth, and Egypt overall, the future they want entails security, freedom, a better economy, national reconciliation and social justice. In addition, the youth discussed the need to foster a culture of engagement and the creation of more avenues for civic involvement. Leveraging the voices of youth can induce real positive change on all levels in Egypt. One development priority that was identified was how to reach different groups of youth and engage them in the society depending on clear economic, political, and social policies. Noha Tarek, Youth Development Specialist/Arab Youth Programme noha.tarek@undp.org

Volunteerism constitutes an important part of the transition to responsible adulthood. It is a valuable vehicle by which young people are exposed to active citizenship. Increasingly, developing countries are introducing volunteerism to young people through the educational system (page 57). Volunteerism is one channel by which young people can engage, especially through youth organizations. Where young people work together through volunteer action, they can contribute to building bridges cross cultures and gender and play their full part in peace processes (page 70).

From the 2011 State of the Worlds Volunteerism Report

So, do you still believe that development doesnt needs

Looking for even more dissemination and advocacy tools for the MDGs and the post-2015 process? Find out more about youth participation http://www.youthpolicy.org/symposia/2013/04/10/participation-resources/

youth?

http://www.youthpolicy.org/development/

United Nations Volunteers

Hermann-Ehlers-Strasse 10 53113 Bonn, Germany

www.unv.org www.volunteeractioncounts.org www.onlinevolunteering.org www.facebook.com/unvolunteers www.youtube.com/unv https://unv.unteamworks.org/node/266207

For further information: contact simona.costanzo@unv.org