Chapters of the African Youth Water Parliament will represent African youth in New York to make their voices heard at the UN Water Conference.
Assessing SDG 6: Clean water and sanitation
The African Youth Parliament for Water will participate in the 2023 United Nations Water Conference in New York from March 22 to 24. This exceptional event takes place 46 years after the first conference dedicated to water and sanitation issues. It is co-organized by the governments of Tajikistan and the Netherlands, inviting the world to unite around a cross-sectoral and action-oriented approach. The focus on Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 6 is to enable the midterm review of the implementation of the UN Decade of Action for Water and Sanitation (2018-2028).
Plenary sessions and interactive dialogues will be organized to cover 5 themes:
- Water for Health
- Water for Development
- Water for Climate, Resilience and Environment
- Water for Cooperation
- Water Action Decade
Water and youth, reviving a virtuous cycle in Africa
Water security is a challenge for many regions experiencing accelerated population growth, industrialization, and urbanization. This is the case for the African continent, which can rely on an inexhaustible resource: the dynamism of its youth.
According to the 2019 World Water Development Report, in sub-Saharan Africa, only 24% of the population has access to safe drinking water (Unesco, 2022).
The conference will be a great opportunity to make the voices of African youth heard. We want to highlight the key issues impacting water that many organizations across Africa are working on. We are convinced of the importance of revitalizing youth policies so that youth can take their place in the decision-making process.
In preparation for the conference, we consulted the 24 national chapters involved in the African Youth Parliament for Water. Their participation laid the foundations for local dynamics in different African countries, specifically in the water sectors. In order to understand the larger scope of these issues, we found it essential to broaden the consultation to other associations (outside the AYPW) covering 8 water-related sectors such as energy, fashion, or agriculture.
In close link with the Global Youth Movement for Water, we organized a Regional Event in February to map African youth organizations and their strategic water issues: North Africa, West Africa, Central Africa, Southern Africa and East Africa. It gathered around 80 associations from countries as diverse as Tunisia, Tanzania, Senegal, and Cameroon.
These dialogues will feed the workshop organized at the United Nations by the African Youth Parliament for Water. Indeed, the issues that emerged during the Regional Event will be discussed and opened for contributions during the conference. At the end of the workshop, we will compile the ideas and proposals in the form of a report outlining the process and its outputs.
We are grateful to the Government of the Netherlands, the International Water Secretariat, the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation, the Netherlands Enterprise Agency (RVO). We also thank our partners in the field who made it possible for these events to have a space for exchange: Radisson Red Rosebank in Johannesburg, Climate Hub Tanzania, Pan African Foundation, Global Water Partnership in Central Africa, and the Centre de Suivi Ecologique in Dakar. Finally, we would like to thank all the young, committed people involved in this process.
If you are concerned about youth, water, and climate policy issues in Africa, do not hesitate to contact us, send a question or make a suggestion.
Bagaté Fatou, Ngague Hisseine Ganda.