This week I was “on the road” for one of my best business travel ever. I was one of the participants of the NMC, the first World Youth Meeting organized on 19-20-21 January in Bari, Italy. Even though I live in Italy since more than 10 years, I was there as a delegate of Turkey, which is the country where I was born.
The goal of the meeting was to get together young people from all over the world– more or less 163 countries– and create a common agenda of priorities for the coming years and a g-local action plan aimed at concretely progressing towards sustainability and participation.
It is not easy to explain the attractiveness of the atmosphere in Fiera del Levante, where we all met together. NMC was about the stories of young people from different languages, races, tribes. The most important thing was sharing experiences, ideas and see how young people are influencing positive changes in various countries and localities. Knowledge was shared and common knowledge base was built. All of us took part in the workshops which addressed how to shift the direction of the development toward sustainability and equity by policies and action carried out principally at local level or through networks of local communities, targeted to specific sectors as Citizenship, Education, Environment, Employment and Economy, Human safety and Development.
We don’t have much time to change the current system of the world! The world population is increasing more than ever and concentrating in urban areas. The necessary resources we need in order to sustain the current development pattern has a non-sustainable impact on environment! Thus, there is a huge risk for the survival of the human race and the other species of the planet: so, it’s urgent to act!..I mean, to begin to act locally towards global!! In fact, the global that we think of seems to be made from certain actors as government’s institutions ecc. but global are us..
The choices of the local governments, the decisions of the citizens and of who represent them are crucial for every possible way towards a sustainable development! The future depends on everything: from the quality of the constructions to the social programs, from the way of linking the water and the energy channels. To have an impact on the decisions related to urban areas and to the region means to be involved directly in the society’s transformation and progress!
The outcome of the workshops proved that if we, young people, get together, we can deal with every kind of problem, because we want a real change in the course of development and we have to be conscious that we have the potential to do it! This is possible with youth engagement and participation to decision making processes!
NMC was just a beginning!
So, start to find your way and make the world change! Together!
Esra