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| EAC Deputy Secretary General in charge of Productive and Social Sectors Hon. Jesca Eriyo |
The 1st East African Community (EAC) Youth Conference themed The EAC Youth: Think. Speak. Participate is scheduled to take place 5 to 6 December 2014 at the EAC Headquarters in Arusha, Tanzania.
According to the EAC Deputy Secretary General in charge of Productive and Social Sectors Hon. Jesca Eriyo, the 1st EAC Youth conference is the first formal process of engaging the Youth in the region following the adoption of the EAC Youth Policy by the EAC Council of Ministers In August 2013.
The Policy guides the Community in planning, implementing, monitoring and evaluating programmes geared towards the youth in the region while ensuring sustainable social, economic and political development.
The theme of the Youth Conference will be realised through discussions on a number of interrelated sub themes including; entrepreneurship, employment, skills development and innovation; leadership, governance, peace building, human rights and conflict management; creativity, expression and transformation; youth and sexual reproductive health and substance abuse; and youth: environment, climate change adaptation and mitigation.
The EAC Youth Conference is expected to bring together over 200 youths drawn from diverse backgrounds taking into account gender, marginalised youth, rural youth, youth living with disabilities, youth in slum dwellings, among others.
Other participants include Government officials, Young Parliamentarians, PSOs, CSOs, professional bodies, Academia/Universities, Media and EAC Organs and Institutions, Development Partners and other interest groups.
Youth participation in EAC affairs is provided for under Article 120 (c) of the EAC Treaty, which provides for adoption of a common approach for the participation of youth in the integration process through education, training and mainstreaming across EAC policies, programmes and projects as one of the strategic interventions towards the realization of a fully integrated Community.
Youth participation is also grounded in the EAC Youth Policy, the 4th EAC Development Strategy (2011 – 2016) and the EAC Strategic Plan on Gender, Youth, Children, Social Protection and Community Development (2012-2016).
In furtherance of the aforementioned provisions, the EAC Secretariat has undertaken a series of interventions aimed at ensuring a more meaningful involvement of the youth in the integration process. Recent initiatives include the convening of the EAC Youth Summit in Arusha, Tanzania 2007 and the 1st, 2nd and 3rd EAC University Students Debates on regional integration in August 2012, August 2013, and September 2014 respectively.
The 2nd EAC University debate resulted into the formation of the EAC Youth Ambassador's Platform as an information infrastructure that would accelerate a youth-focused integration through knowledge and experience sharing from the EAC and within the youth communities across the region.
The youth civil society fraternity in the EAC has also been active through different initiatives to create opportunities for their own engagement with the EAC processes with the recent establishment of the East African Youth Network (EAYN) as a positive step towards a platform to amplify their voices for collective advocacy and engagement.
The EAYN is composed of youth CSO's and National Youth Councils in the Partner States. The EAC interventions as well as those of the youth civil society in the region have focused on addressing the contemporary youth challenges such as unemployment, high HIV-AIDS prevalence rate, drugs and substance abuse, low participation of the youths in development among others.
Therefore, the 1st EAC Youth Conference is convened as a platform to disseminate the Youth policy, strengthen existing pillars as well as set new strategies for more sustained and meaningful engagement of the youth in the overall EAC integration agenda.
