Youth Development
(Contributing SDGs: 1, 4, 8, 10, 13, 16)
The Youth Development programme of CSSP aims to organize, educate, engage, and empower the youth (aged 15 to 30) to take action for building a sustainable future and creating a positive impact in society through different campaigns and initiatives. The goal is to equip the youth with necessary skills and knowledge to increase their role in public affairs. CSSP aims to create a generation of responsible and engaged citizens who can drive positive social and environmental change.
Objectives
- To empower youth through educating, organizing, and engaging in different youth led and youth focused initiatives to strengthen their social, political and democratic participation.
- To capacitate the youth on various socio-economic, political, and governance issues in Pakistan through trainings, seminars, and exposure visits.
- To provide skill development training and promote entrepreneurship/self-employment among low-income youth.
- To promote education and peace with youth-led campaigns for active mobilization of social issues
A successful youth development model
Empowering the Voice of New Generation (EVNG), a youth transforming programme with the goal to educate, engage and empower the youth, was an initiative of the CSSP. It was implemented in 40 districts of Pakistan where more than 10,000 youth were covered across the Sindh, KPK and Punjab provinces. The key interventions under the programme include;
Trained youth on themes including Governance, Accountability, Transparency, Democracy, Socio – Economic and Political situation analysis, Role of State and Civil Society, Globalization, Water and Energy crisis in Pakistan, Rule of law, Peace and justice, Advocacy and Networking skills, and Right-based approach.
The successful culmination of the CSSP’s VNG programme was the VNG becoming an independently registered youth led and youth focused organization in 2013 and is now implementing different projects and consultancies with other organizations.
- Conducted four annual National Youth Conferences from 2010 to 2013 in Hyderabad, Multan and Islamabad on themes including Youth in Political and Social Activism, Unity in Diversity for Peaceful Coexistence, Building Democratic Society, 18th Amendment & Decentralization of Youth Affairs Department, Provincial Youth Policy, and budget 2013, Election 2013 and Youth Participation in Political Process.
- Conducted Study visits, summer camps, exposure visits to coastal area, parliament and embassies.
- Established the Information Resource Centre (IRC) to provide research-based information on different subjects to VNG members.
- Led important social campaigns on Tree plantation, Peacebuilding, Copy culture, misuse of amenity property titled ‘We Want to Play’ and ‘Say No to Encroachment’, employment of non-locals in the Tharparkar Coal project.
- Organized Democracy week, sports events, policy dialogues, other.
- Formulated Sindh Youth Policy draft after several consultation workshops with different stakeholders
Leading the formulation & Approval of Sindh Youth Policy
The CSSP has played a prominent/key role in formulation of the Sindh Youth policy After 18th Amendment, all the provinces had to develop youth policy at provincial level. Sindh Youth policy draft was prepared in 2012 by youth affairs department, UNFPA and Bargad. CSSP closely worked with Youth Affairs department, Government of Sindh in organizing consultations on the policy. CSSP became part of the policy redrafting process, the recommendations on the policy were prepared and shared with technocrats, academia, civil society organizations, media and elected representatives to provide their feedback on the revised draft. The youth affairs department acknowledged CSSP’s efforts and incorporated all the recommendations in the draft. The Policy was approved by Govt of Sindh in April 2018. Additionally, CSSP conducted 20 policy consultations/dialogues in 10 districts of Sindh, and engaged more than 4000 youth in reviewing the policy draft and formulating recommendations to enrich the document produced by the Ministry of Youth Affairs.
Youth Employability
The CSSP focuses on engaging and empowering the youth through various employability interventions that aim to enhance their skills, promote entrepreneurship, and create linkages with micro-finance institutions and market hubs. The objective is to capacitate low-income youth for self-employment and entrepreneurship and provide opportunities in which youth from diverse backgrounds can thrive and benefit from shared economic growth and opportunities.
Established 25 Rozagar Centers at Community Level
Skill Development (TVET) Trainings to 3100 youths
70% Trained Youth Employed
Cottage Industry
The CSSP team visited different parts of Punjab to study and explore the possibility of introducing cottage industry in Sindh. The team identified potential trades like soap making, surf making, oil extraction, spices (masala) making & packaging, dung wood, color making, chappal making and pellet making. In order to train the youth (Boys and Girls), machinery have been purchased and installed at Mirpurkhas for demonstration and training. The CSSP will support the interested youth in establishing the cottage industry at their homes and help in connecting with the market. MoU will be signed with Micro finance Institutes (MFIs), Labour Department, and other relevant organization/department to facilitate the youth in establishing the cottage industry.
Other Youth Initiatives
Engaging youth in promoting Peace
The CSSP worked with young volunteers to promote peace building in district across Pakistan through various initiatives. This included establishing thematic youth groups and training members as Master Trainers to replicate learned skills in their respective areas, selecting 20 Youth Peace Ambassadors (YPAs) in 20 districts and conducting their orientation session to launch the “peace is possible” campaign, conducting trainings on topics such as interfaith harmony and social cohesion, and engaging youth in theatre performances and awareness-raising campaigns to counter violent extremism. Additionally, organized a national-level Peace Symposium where 230 youth participated, and a 2-day mega Sports Peace Festival participated by 3800 youth, engaged youth in rapid assessment activities to counter violent extremism where 875 youth leaders participated in discussions/ meetings, and conducted media monitoring activities and knowledge management of issues pertaining to women, children, and minorities.
Engaging youth in Sports
The CSSP engaged youth in sports by organizing sports festivals at UC, Taluka, and district level. This included organizing a 2-day Annual Girls Sports Festival where more than 500 young girls from different schools and colleges participated in different games, a 2-day Sports Peace Festival where over 3800 youth, including 300 girls from
Engaging youth in promotion of Education
The CSSP engaged youth volunteers in the Out of School Children (OOSC) enrollment campaign. A total of 530 youth aged 18-32 (ILMAmbassadors) were trained and engaged in the enrollment drive in public primary schools in the 4 districts. Overall, the volunteers were engaged in HH Survey, OOSC identification, mobilization, enrollment, and retention.
Engaging youth in Climate change initiatives & flood response
The CSSP conducted training of youth of age 18-35 under the Active Citizens Digital Model. The trained youth then conducted the Social Action Projects (SAPs) in their respective vicinity areas. Around 230 trained youth volunteers were able to conduct 20 SAPs in consonance with mitigating climate change effects: the social actions were around clean & green society, COVID-19 safety &prevention, reducing the use of plastic bags, social distancing, environment protection, urban forest, clean public parks, and tree plantation.
The CSSP engaged youth in the relief response of mega flood in 2010-11 where it trained 1,560 youth in in camp management and were deployed in relief camps where they conducted camps need assessment, camps registration and facilitating government and nongovernment organizations.