Accelerating the Recovery from the Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19) and the Full Implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development at Levels - ECOSOC Youth side event

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Making the SDGs work for adolescents and young people – What does it take?

Today, the world has more young people than at any time in history. Yet far too many of today’s 1.8 billion adolescents and youth (ages 10-24) are underserved by current policy and financing attention.

The 1.8 Billion Young People for Change campaign, a multi-year advocacy campaign places a spotlight on the well-being of adolescents and young people including and demands greater action, leading up to the UN Summit of the Future in 2024. The Global Forum for Adolescents, to be held 11-12 October 2023, will be a major milestone in that effort.

The Forum is a massive virtual platform for partners from around the world to share evidence, engage partners, spark multi-sectoral action and call for political and financial commitments for adolescent well-being through a series of national events and a two-day virtual global programme.

Objectives

This event is co-organized by PMNCH, UN MGCY, YieldHub, FIA Foundation, Girl Effect, Plan International, AGIP and FEMNET. It is proposed that the event draws attention to the health and well-being agenda of adolescents and youth, while addressing the multi-sectoral and multidimensional nature of the challenges they face globally and the challenges that have been further exacerbated in light of COVID-19, as well as offer platforms such as the 1.8 campaign and the Global Forum for Adolescents as spaces for intergeneration dialogue, meaningful engagement and youth-led action. The event will also feature the launch of the report by Girl’s Effect, providing an illustrative example of how mobility and logistics can impact the access of girls to Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights (SRHR), demonstrating the multifaceted issues that need to be addressed by multiple sectors and industries to ensure the well-being of young people. The event will leverage the presence of multiple stakeholders to:

• Highlight, discuss and deliberate on the health and well-being needs of adolescents and youth globally, especially in light of COVID-19 recovery;
• Identify ways in which adolescent’s and youth’s health and well-being can be improved using digital technology and innovation as well as mobility and logistics;
• Share knowledge and best practices on implementing inter-sectoral policies and programmes that have enabled countries to advance the health and well-being of adolescents and youth;
• Facilitate dialogue among adolescents and youth and policy makers to meaningfully engage them in policy making and implementation ensuring that their contextspecific needs related to their well-being are integrated;
• Use a ‘what young people want’ approach in line with the vision of the 1.8 campaign and inform the Global Forum for Adolescents (GFA) that will take place on 11-12 October 2023 and the multi-year 1.8 Billion Campaign.