UN commission hails Egypt’s World Youth Forum contributions as global platform for youth issues

CAIRO – 18 February 2021: The United Nations Social Development Commission (CSocD) has adopted a decision referring to all the three versions of Egypt’s World Youth Forum as an international platform to discuss youth issues, state’s news agency MENA reported.

The decision was endorsed by Egypt, Senegal, Cape Verde, Kazakhstan and Portugal.

The World Youth Forum was first launched in South Sinai’s Sharm El-Sheikh city under the auspices and with the attendance of President Abdel Fattah El Sisi.

Egypt’s permanent mission to the UN in New York included the decision issued by the 59th session of the CSocD to support the contributions of the World Youth Forum at the regional and international levels.

Egypt's permanent representative to the UN Mohamed Edris said youth issues are currently a top priority on the UN agenda. He added that the recent WYF-related decision reflects the Egyptian efforts made during the past years in terms of youth empowerment.

He noted that the decision comes in recognition of the contributions of the three editions of the forum in discussing contemporary issues related to youth and their role in achieving the 2030 sustainable development agenda.

The WYF has been held for three consecutive years, the last of which was in 2019.

The last version was attended by 7,000 participants, who were admitted out of 300,000 applicants.

Parallel workshops were held for participants in the WYF 2019 to exchange views on the topics that were later discussed by panelists. The 16 panel discussions consisted of seven sessions on technology, three sessions on the Mediterranean, two sessions on Africa, one session on women, one session on climate change, one session on peace and security, and one session on arts.

The forum concluded a number of recommendations, including launching African initiatives to promote digital transformation and combat digital piracy and launching an Arab-African digital platform for publishing women's studies and funding women initiatives.