With some 1.5 billion young people between the ages of 12 and 24 in the world, youth represent a tremendous opportunity to accelerate economic growth and reduce poverty worldwide. There has never been a better time to focus on young people. Young people are healthier and better educated than previous generations and they will join the workforce with fewer dependents because of changing demographics. It is proven that developing countries which invest in better education, healthcare, and job training of young people between the ages of 12 and 24 years of age could produce surging economic growth and sharply reduced poverty.

With the main objective of creating dialogue and exchange of ideas and experiences between the Bank and youth organizations, this year, for the first time ever, the World Bank and IMF Annual Meetings included a special three-day session devoted to youth. From October 8–10, a group of 17 youth leaders representing 14 nations were invited to join the session. Each of them was recommended by the regions, country teams, or other partners and all of them had experience in taking the lead in development initiatives. Many belonged to the Bank’s Youth for Development and Peace networks and Youth Advisory Groups. The young leaders from around the world used their time at the Annual Meetings to discuss their projects, goals, and development concerns. The sessions in which these youth leaders participated encouraged the sharing of many great ideas and initiatives. The young leaders’ time at the Annual Meetings cumulated with an action plan for how youth can become bigger players in development. The hope is that Youth@Annual Meetings will become a fixture during future Annual Meetings as such facilitating a more in-depth role for young people in the World Bank Group.

What They Talked About

The sessions provided a space for young leaders to confer and present major development concerns from a youth perspective and over the three days, participants shared their views on topics including how young people can exercise citizenship and make their voices heard in society, the school-to-work transition and the World Bank's engagement with youth.

The topic of exercising citizenship and including young people in the development process was heavily discussed during the sessions. Renata Florentino, who works on a project to improve cities in Brazil with and for youth, talked about how important it is to involve everyone. "When you put all the groups together, you can really make a change," she said, adding that while it can take a long time to bring everyone on board, the end result is more participatory and therefore effective. Her view was further elaborated by Mark Garcia of Silliman University in the Philippines, who works on projects that aim to increase youth involvement in monitoring transparency in local government and who highlighted that there was a need for governments to put an emphasis on the involvement of young people in each country’s development process in order to mobilize young people to be more civically engaged. He added that low self-worth leads many young people to doubt their ability to make a difference.  "If they're not convinced that they have value," he said, "they are hard to mobilize."

The young leaders’ discussion on the continued need for young people to be more civically engaged resulted in an action plan on how youth can be vital partners in development. 

Action Plan: Teaming Up with World Bank

Taking into consideration what the World Bank does and its priorities, participants brainstormed over how youth can be more involved in what the World Bank does and developed an action plan to be implemented in the coming year. The youth delegation will be taking the fundamental steps in ensuring the implementation of the action plan.

Firstly, as highlighted by the youth leaders, one of the main focuses of the action plan was to strengthen coordination of youth organizations at the local, national, regional and global level. This includes identifying Youth Advisory Groups, Youth for Development and Peace networks, and national Youth Councils that exist in a particular country. As such a mapping exercise will be carried out by the youth leaders over the next few months to create an international database of youth organizations that will be shared amongst the youth delegation and the World Bank. The young leaders aimed to use this information to strengthen Youth for Development and Peace networks and Youth Advisory Group initiatives.

Secondly, the youth leaders also hope to enhance information dissemination and make World Bank information more youth friendly and localized. Along with ‘translating’ the World Bank document so that it would appeal more to a younger crowd, the youth leaders will also go through training about information on World Bank projects in the pipeline so as to ensure as much as possible the involvement of young people in World Bank activities.

Thirdly, the youth highlighted the need for youth participation in the country assistance strategy process, where young people in their respective countries will be part of the consultation process; it was agreed that having a Youth seat at the table in Country Assistance Strategy consultations would allow the youth to represent themselves more effectively. The involvement of young people in the planning of the consultations would also provide more focus groups in consultations.

Lastly, it was decided that 2008’s youth delegation will plan for the Youth @ Annual Meeting 2009 to ensure continued participation of young people at the Annual Meetings.

It was generally agreed that the sessions helped to clarify and increase the knowledge among the youth about the work and priorities of the World Bank. The work plan is currently in its implementation stage and the youth leaders are continuing to work with the bank to ensure its full implementation. As a member of the youth delegation who was part of the brainstorming process and who will be part of the implementation process of the Action Plan, I am excited and hopeful that the action plan will be successful in getting more young people involved with the World Bank and its activities. Considering the enthusiasm of both the youth leaders and the World Bank on the implementation process, I am confident that the action plan would be put to good use.

The power of young people for change has long been recognized by members of the development community. As young people are the immediate future of our countries, the betterment of future generations largely depends on them. The implementation of the work plan will help enhance young people’s involvement in the civic development processes of their countries and would be a large step towards promoting youth-led development.