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Finding solutions together with youth

“YoU-CAN is pivotal. Young people form the backbone of UNESCO, and they will be its future. It is strategically important that UNESCO embrace the passion and motivation of the world’s youth, to help the Organization think outside the box and find new solutions to the world’s very complex challenges,” says Nicole Webley, Youth Focal Point for the Natural Sciences Sector.

While supporting the Strategic Transformation’s pursuit of a strengthened partnership culture, YoU-CAN will also help advance UNESCO’s Strategy for Action on Climate Change (2018-2021). It will facilitate, amongst many other things, sharing and upscaling of ideas, collaboration between networks and organizations, and wider implementation of successful grassroots projects. Crucially, it will provide youth with a safe space to communicate and generate solutions to a global issue that can be, in some cases, politically fraught. Not only this, networking can be a practical way for young people to participate in this important work in a way that circumvents many of the challenges and inequalities they are faced with.

The power of youth networks to help create the “Next Normal”

“Recognizing that the youth of today are some of the strongest voices for social change and particularly for climate action means that connecting and supporting these voices is vital. Establishing such a large network will help the global youth movement to maintain its momentum for advocacy and activism, as well as for seeking and implementing practical solutions to climate change,” says Kristina Balalovska of the Youth Team, Youth and Sport Section, Social and Human Sciences Sector.

Numerous such challenges have revealed themselves acutely during the COVID-19 pandemic. According to the project team, two key attendant issues that must be considered by YoU-CAN relate to, firstly, how the pandemic has influenced climate debate and action, and secondly, how COVID-19 has disproportionately impacted young people.

Climate change has continued unabated despite COVID-19 lockdowns, and the fight against it has been hampered by impacts of the pandemic. There has similarly been deterioration in environmental protection around the world, not to mention issues like increased waste associated with single-use products. Despite this, there have also been global calls to use the crisis recovery as an opportunity to “build back better”, like  UNESCO's Next Normal campaign. This momentum, which follows in the wake of a global youth uprising on climate issues, cannot be wasted, and YoU-CAN can be an incredibly pertinent and powerful tool to this end.  

COVID-19 has also brought to bear many of the challenges faced by youth around the world, including precarious access to education, employment, and social safety nets. Global lockdowns have increased precarity in youth employment which, hand-in-hand with associated vulnerability in housing, food security and so on, present a barrier to effective youth engagement in climate action. At the same time, young people have also spearheaded exemplary actions to fight the pandemic and its consequences. YoU-CAN represents a highly relevant way of handling such challenges, by strengthening supportive networks that link young people from all walks of life and valorizing their work.

“Youth engagement in climate action is more prevalent – and vital – now than it has ever been. Around the world, young people have been actively contributing to recovery measures and calling for change from governments, the private sector, and the international community. They are the drivers of a sustainable future, and their ability to access capacity building, networking and collaboration opportunities is critical. YoU-CAN can help to create such synergies and enable their voices to be heard,” says Manon Frezouls, YoU-CAN coordinator.