Online, 6 October 2022 — Following the historical Resolution 76/306, adopted by the United Nations General Assembly on September 8, 2022, the Office of the Secretary-General’s Envoy on Youth (OSGEY) organized a virtual youth consutation to gather ideas and feedback from the world’s youth on the upcoming establishment of the UN Youth Office.
The United Nations Youth Office is meant to do the following:
- Lead engagement and advocacy for the advancement of youth issues across the United Nations, in the areas of peace and security, sustainable development and human rights.
- Promote meaningful, inclusive and effective engagement of youth and youth-led and youth-focused organizations in the work of the United Nations, working in close collaboration across the United Nations system.
- Encourage greater United Nations system-wide collaboration, coordination and accountability on the advancement of youth issues, including United Nations support to Member States, as appropriate and upon their request, in promoting the effective and meaningful engagement, participation and empowerment of youth.
- Encourage the identification of focal points on youth, within existing resources, across the United Nations system and in United Nations country teams.
- Engage with youth-focused envoys, representatives and offices of regional organizations on advancing youth issues.
- Propose innovative approaches to advance multi-stakeholder initiatives on the engagement and empowerment of youth, for the consideration of Member States.
- Promote and facilitate intergenerational and intercultural dialogue, collaboration and solidarity.
- Support efforts to enhance youth representation at the United Nations, including through increasing and improving the conditions of internships and employment opportunities for youth, especially for youth from developing countries and with due regard to gender balance.
- Support ongoing efforts towards the mobilization of financial and technical support and investment to promote and upscale quality and inclusive education and training, skills development, capacity-building and bridging the digital divide, in tandem with job creation, for youth and creating an enabling environment for harnessing their talents and abilities to contribute to their societies.
- Conduct outreach to youth and youth-led and youth-focused organizations, through innovative means, including the use of social media.
In this regard, UNODC’ s YouthLED Integrity Advisory Board, as the first formal mechanism of its genre in operations at UNODC, was invited not only to participate to the discussions but also to provide speaking remarks.
Mr. Max Amanu, education and youth empowerment advcate from Uganda, was nominated to represent the YouthLED Board at the online consutlation that took place on 6 October 2022.
The consultation acted as a platform for global youth to share their views with OSGEY and contribute meaningfully to the process of establishing the United Nations Youth Office in the Secretariat.
The objectives of the Youth Consultation were:
- To engage youth representing a wide and diverse range of youth organizations and networks from all regions of the world in which they will present their input to the Executive Office of the UN Secretary-General on the modalities and creation of a UN Youth Office.
- To hear from youth on how to enhance UN efforts on youth, and youth expectations from the UN Youth Office.
The outcomes of the consultation are to be included in the “Report of the United Nations Youth Office”, which the Secretary-General will submit to the General Assembly.
UNODC YouthLED Board was able to not only commend the novelties regarding the UN Youth Office reporting mechanism, which puts forth the itneresting requirement of the newly established Office to report not only to UN Member States but also to youth representatives, but also to suggest the Office to provide education and training to keep building the capacity of youth to support different UN entities as well as Member States and finally to express the need for the Office to promote the establishment of more Youth Advisory Boards across the UN following the example of UNODC’s YouthLED Board and create avenues for cooperation.
