UN adopts World Youth Forum as an int’l platform, praises its role to empower youth

CAIRO – 18 February 2021: The United Nations adopted “World Youth Forum” as an international platform, in recognition of the contributions of the three editions of the forum in discussing youth issues, problems and achievements along with their role achieving the 2030 sustainable development agenda.

Egypt’s Permanent Mission to the United Nations in New York, announced including the resolution issued during the 59th session within the frame work of the Committee for Social Development of the Economic and Social Council to support the contributions of the World Youth Forum which was launched by Egypt to empower youth all over the world.

On February 16, the Social Development Committee approved the resolution, which was sponsored by Egypt and submitted by Senegal, Cape Verde, Portugal and Kazakhstan, including a special reference to the three editions of the World Youth Forum that was launched in Sharm el-Sheikh in 2017 as an international platform to discuss youth issues.

Egypt's permanent representative to the UN in New York, Ambassador Mohamed Idris, said that youth issues are currently a ‘top priority on the United Nations agenda’, and that the inclusion of the Economic and Social Council resolution along with special reference to the World Youth Forum praises the Egyptian efforts made during the past years in terms of youth empowerment.

The WYF has been held for three consecutive years, the last of which was in 2019.

The last version was attended by 7,000 participants, who were admitted out of 300,000 applicants.

Parallel workshops were held for participants in the WYF 2019 to exchange views on the topics that were later discussed by panelists. The 16 panel discussions consisted of seven sessions on technology, three sessions on the Mediterranean, two sessions on Africa, one session on women, one session on climate change, one session on peace and security, and one session on arts.

The forum concluded a number of recommendations, including launching African initiatives to promote digital transformation and combat digital piracy and launching an Arab-African digital platform for publishing women's studies and funding women initiatives.