The World Programme of Action for Youth is 20 years old!

The WPAY (World Programme of Action for Youth) was adopted by the General Assembly of the United Nations in 1995. The European Youth Forum wishes the WPAY a very happy birthday for its 20th anniversary and underlines the added value of this essential tool, which provides a global framework for youth policy.

The WPAY provides a policy framework and practical guidelines for national action and international support to improve the situation of young people around the world, including in countries which do not have a developed youth policy. It covers fifteen youth priority areas and contains proposals for action in each of these areas.

Whilst the WPAY has proved to be a very valuable tool over the last 20 years, there has been a recurrent call for better follow-up and monitoring tool for this programme. The Youth Forum strongly supports the initiative led by the UN Secretary General’s Envoy on Youth to push for a better use of the WPAY, a process initiated with the first Global Forum on Youth Policy, which was held in Baku in October 2014 and promoted in the Baku commitment to youth policy. The Youth Forum also welcomes and further encourages work around indicators for the WPAY, as carried out by the UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs and its Focal Point on Youth. Indicators are a key tool in the quest for better monitoring and follow-up.

The Youth Forum believes that bringing greater visibility to the WPAY should be accompanied by a review of this framework, in order to update to the situation in 2015. This process should be done with the involvement of youth stakeholders from civil society and the relevant institutions. Moreover, we hope that more visibility will be given to the implementation tool, which aims to provide a framework to assess a country’s progress in reaching the goals set in the WPAY. However, the Youth Forum believes that this implementation tool should also be adapted for a better commitment of Member States to the Programme.

In order to fully implement the WPAY, young people must have access to all of their human rights and fundamental freedoms and governments must take effective action against violations of these rights and freedoms. For 20 years, this Programme has provided an important basis for strenghtening youth policy the world and, with a review and better use of the Programme, it can continue to make a positive difference to young people!

Read more:

- Click here to view a pdf version of the World Programme of Action for Youth.

-About the programme : The fifteen fields of action identified by the international community are education, employment, hunger and poverty, health, environment, substance abuse, juvenile justice, leisure-time activities, girls and young women and the full and effective participation of youth in the life of society and in decision-making, as well as globalization, information and communication technologies, HIV/AIDS, armed conflict, and intergenerational issues.