August News /

Brazil: Strengthening the YES-YEN alliance

The YES Network in Brazil is leading the way in producing concrete results from the YES-YEN alliance.  The YES Brazil Network is working in the promotion of Municipal Youth Employment Action Plans and already undertaking the execution of a pilot plan in the Apucarana municipality.

In March of this year, a global alliance between the Youth Employment Summit (YES) Campaign and the Youth Employment Network (YEN) was formed to promote youth participation in the formation of National Action Plans in 11 lead countries.  The case of Brazil has provided a successful model of this cooperation. 

Upon the signing of the global agreement, the YES Network in Brazil committed to collaborate actively with the Secretary General of YEN as well as with the Minister of Labor and Employment, focusing specifically in the development and implementation of the National Action Plan for Youth Employment.  In order to do so, YES Brazil developed a strategy and partnerships to promote the creation of “Municipal Youth Employment Action Plans”, as a way to decentralize the challenge of promoting more and better opportunities for productive and decent work for the youth. This strategy was developed and shared with the United Nations in April.  In June, the YES Brazil co-coordinator, Marcelo Costa, presented this proposal for the elaboration and implementation of Youth Employment Action Plans at the local government level to the General Secretary of YEN as well as the Labor Minister of Brazil at the YEN encounter within the Annual Conference of ILO.

Currently, the YES Network in Brazil is working alongside the Ministry of Labor and other partners to launch a “National Pact on Youth Employment” to make this agreement a reality.  They expect to launch it officially at the Ministerial Forum to take place within the YES Latin American Encounter on Youth Employment in Asunción, Paraguay, September 19-21st.

While waiting for this official launch to occur, YES Brazil is developing a pilot project in the city of Apucarana in partnership with the local government and other local institutions. Apucarana’s selection for this pilot program is attributable to the high level of commitment on the part of the Mayor, the  many youth involved in municipal management, the Municipal Government’s facility in working with local NGO’s, the youth organizations in the city, and the city’s medium size (population: 110,000). With the financial support of the municipal government, a task-force was created among the YES Brazil Network, the Municipality and a local NGOto undertake the design and implementation of a “Municipal Youth Employment Action Plan”.

Some of the activities included in this plan are:

• Technical assistance for the municipal team;
• Mobilization of municipal actors and stakeholders;
• Municipal diagnostic on youth employment;
• Mapping of key challenges;
• Multi-actors municipal strategic plan;
• Replication of best-practices.

Consistent with YES Campaign actions, youth and youth-serving organizations will be involved in various aspects of the plan’s implementation according to their know-how and organizational focus.

For more information contact Marcelo Costa, YES Brazil Co-coordinator at marcelo@yesbrasil.info