(CARICOM Secretariat, Turkeyen, Greater Georgetown, Guyana) - Suriname - the beating heart of the Amazon - is where it all started some two years ago on March 5, 2007 when eight young commissioners accompanied by six technical experts raised their right hands and pledged to conduct “a full scale analysis of challenges and opportunities for youth in the CARICOM Single Market and Economy (CSME); and to make recommendations on how to improve their well-being and empowerment.”
They were officially the CARICOM Commission on Youth development (CCYD). Their mandate was given to them by the 27Th Conference of Heads of Government of the Caribbean Community, after recognising and accepting that the future of the integration movement rests squarely on the shoulders of productive, contributing, self-asserting young people who make up approximately two-thirds of the Caribbean population.
The composition of the CCYD was indeed a unique experiment. It was the first time that CARICOM was using a blend of youth and senior technical experts to guide the decision making process of the Conference. Armstrong Alexis, one of the Commissioners noted that “this innovative model provided opportunities for the views and opinions of young people to be intertwined with technical guidance and expertise of senior professionals.”
The experiment he said had resulted in a fresh and highly unique model which had infused a youth friendly approach to the development discourse in the Region and had placed young people at the centre of the CSME debate. And a debate it was which has taken the Commission from Member State to Member State harnessing the views of young people; probing their circumstances and situation and providing a forum in which they could tell their stories.
The stories they told were many and varied and in some instances revealed “wide-spread ignorance and growing cynicism among adolescents and youth about regional integration, the Community and the CSME in particular.” Yet in other instances there were reassurances that when engaged on those issues, “youth expressed their vision for a unified community and a willingness to share the message of regionalism and CSME.”
Now, Suriname - the lead country with responsibility for youth development in the quasi Cabinet of CARICOM Conference of Heads of Government - is where the Commission’s work will end some two years later on 29-30 January 2010, when the CCYD presents an “interesting yet disturbing” situation of Caribbean youth – a situation analysis which hinges on ten strategic strands of education and training; youth unemployment; health, sexual and reproductive lifestyles and practices; crime and violence; migration, citizenship, Caribbean identity and the CSME; external challenges to cultural values; governance, politics and youth participation and youth vulnerabilities.
This draft Report has a philosophical underpinning which rejects the paradigm in which youth are viewed as ‘problem’ and which does not adequately consider their assets, contribution and achievements; and presents a new paradigm in which youth are viewed as creative assets and valuable human resources to be developed, and not a problem to be solved; partners in the development of the Region and not only as beneficiaries and as the future, yet also the present because they can and do contribute to national and regional identity and development
This draft CCYD Report contains the voices of Caribbean youth yearning for empowerment through equitable access to the social, economic and political resources; In this report there are the voices of Haitian youth calling for a better quality of life in a Community where all “will eat when they are hungry and not when they can find food…”
But the draft report is not about gloom and doom. It is about the dreams, aspirations and the future of the 9 million strong young people within the Caribbean Community. It is about celebrating the excellence among young people; it is about recognising their creative potential and creating the enabling environment to optimise and sustain that potential for the future of a strong Community For All. It is about giving the young people a voice and wings to soar!
With this in mind the recommendations contained in the report are of crucial importance as they reflect forward thinking policies, crafted by young people for young people about developing young people as invaluable human capital.
The recommendations cover a gamut of policy issues which range from increasing knowledge and appreciation of the CSME through massive public education; developing youth as a valuable human capital; and revising the Treaty of Chaguaramas to embrace a Human Resource Development paradigm in order to ensure that the role of youth in the integration process is explicitly recognized and provided for.
The draft Report also recognises the world-wide acclaim and comparative advantage that the Region has in arts, culture and sports and recommends “Sport for All” which translates into the recognition that every person has the right to engage in sport in the pursuit of excellence, wellness or friendships regardless of economic status, religion, or physical limitations.
So now the Commission has run its leg and will pass the baton to the policy makers at the Special Summit. But the end is just the beginning: CARICOM Heads of Government will now take the baton as the Community seeks to ensure an enabling environment for youth to become meaningful citizens of the Caribbean, capable of functioning effectively in a new global order.
While the heads of Government listen, read and deliberate, the rest of the Region including 9 million young people will await not only their responses but the actions based on those responses. In the words of a Haitian youth to the Commission:
“Do not view this report as just another; do not shelve it; do not allow two years of qualitative findings to languish; deliberate it, as you should; challenge it if you will; act upon it as you must but DO SOMETHING. The hopes of 9 million young people are pinned not on what you say, but on what you will do. DO SOMETHING."
