International Youth Day

   Referred to as the “torchbearers” of the Sustainable Development Goals , youth played a major role in the process to secure agreement on the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. With some 90 Sustainable Development Goal indicators deemed to be youth-related, youth have a vested interest in the realization of the Goals.7 As illustrated in the figure below, they stand to benefit significantly from the achievement of the Goals and, as outlined in subsequent sections, they are playing a major role as partners and participants in implementation. Youth are also crucial actors in strengthening peace and security . When engaged as partners for peace, they help to shift a widespread perception of mistrust of young people, to more accurately presenting youth as “ positive and constructive social agents ” who play an essential role in building sustainable peace. The normative foundation for youth-led peacebuilding efforts was laid in Security Council resolution 2250...

    Children and youth account for two thirds of the world's poor , yet are often excluded from decision-making processes on poverty reduction and eradication. Financial inclusion can support youth in accumulating savings and reducing the impact of economic shocks.   Hunger and malnutrition often prevent youth and children from taking part in society , at every level. Responsibly engaging youth in sustainable agricultural policies and practices is essential for achieving Sustainable Development Goal 2.   Investing in the health and well-being of youth can support sustainable development outcomes around the world. The active participation of young people can lead to better health outcomes, including with respect to vaccination programmes and mental health. The coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic has had a detrimental impact on the education of children and youth.  Ensuring access to inclusive and equitable quality education is es...

  Many Governments have taken steps towards ensuring meaningful youth participation since the adoption of the World Programme of Action for Youth in 1995. A significant proportion of Governments have put in place national youth policies and many have also established mech anisms to facilitate more structured participation of young people in decision-making (see table 2 for illustrative examples). Some countries have established national youth councils. These serve as representative bodies that have a consultative role in the definition of youth policies. They have the right to formulate opinions and recommendations on youth issues directed to policymaking bodies at all levels of government. In some instances, youth councils are established and defined by law. In others, they are non-governmental organizations without an official legal basis that are considered as part ners to be consulted by the national authorities. National youth parliaments provide another ave ...

  Young people have been actively engaged in the decision-making architecture of the United Nations for decades . This has evolved consider ably during the past 20 years, yet major gaps in coverage remain. In Agenda 21, adopted at the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development in 1992, Member States called upon “each country and the United Nations to support the promotion and creation of mechanisms to involve youth representation in all United Nations processes in order to influence those processes”. In response to this and other similar pronouncements, there has been a steady, if uneven, expansion of arrangements to enable young people to actively engage in intergovernmental decision-making processes . Formal youth engagement in the follow-up to the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development is carried out through the Major Group for Children and Youth , one of the major groups and other stakeholder constituencies. The Major Group for Children and Y...

  Meaningful youth engagement refers to how youth should be involved in decision-making and policymaking processes. Over the years, govern ments, youth organizations and United Nations entities have developed a series of principles that, when implemented collectively, can help to ensure that youth engagement is more meaning ful and effective – from the perspective both of youth constituencies and of policymakers.1 When youth engagement strays from these prin ciples, it risks becoming tokenistic and can result in decision-making that is divorced from young people’s lived realities, expertise and solutions. As a result, trust and confidence in public insti tutions are eroded2 and policymaking is rendered less effective