Title: African Youth Partnership for an equitable recovery from the global COVID-19 pandemic

Click the following link to explore the project testimonials: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1YJI0qMbPBajkmQCU_ma_G8tInNlDwMos/view

Focus Area: Advocacy | Youth Employment | Economic Growth and Trade

Aligned SDGs

Target: Youth and Youth with Disabilities.

Location: Tanzania, Kenya, Uganda, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Gambia, Ghana, Liberia, Nigeria and Sierra Leone.

Description: The Ford Foundation is funding the project, which will be implemented by Restless Development and Youth Opportunity & Transformation in Africa (YOTA).Youth Power Organization (YPO) has been engaged as a Youth Task Team to implement groundwork.

YPO will develop and implement policy accountability frameworks, produce collective reviews and evidence of the performance of national and regional COVID-19 recovery programmes, and amplify youth voices in policy spaces, thereby influencing national and regional policies, programmes and budgets in favour of more equitable and inclusive recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic.

Project Summary

The COVID-19 pandemic has, without a doubt, exacerbated significant global economic and social challenges. In Africa, young people, especially the vulnerable youth, have not been spared by the devastating effects of the pandemic. The disruption by the COVID-19 pandemic has amplified many of the challenges already facing the continent’s youth.

In eastern Africa, the pandemic has had a ravaging effect on youth economic opportunity, and according to a survey conducted by the YouLead Consortium on young people’s experience with COVID-19, youth in Kenya, Tanzania, and Uganda emphasised that lockdown measures interfered with their income and education. At the same time, reduced mobility, increased costs of products, and a global recession have significantly affected their participation in informal sector activity.

African governments must deal with critical vaccine access, uptake and distribution issues. However, they have yet to address growing concerns about authoritarianism, the mismanagement of COVID-19 funds, and the allocation of resources meant to intervene in health, education, and infrastructural development. Corruption, represented in the lack of transparency and accountability during the pandemic, is affecting inclusive and sustainable recovery for youth and other marginalised groups.

Current estimates suggest that young people below 35 constitute about 65% of Africa’s population. They have a high appetite for leading continental pandemic recovery efforts. Many have already exemplified themselves as active agents in the fight against COVID-19 by volunteering as frontliners in essential services, while others are constantly innovating to meet the emerging demands for crucial products.

There should therefore be no recovery efforts on the continent without youth. YOTA, Restless Development and Youth Power Organization thus seek to escalate youth action for an equitable recovery across Africa, focusing on the following pilot countries: Gambia, Ghana, Liberia, Nigeria, Kenya, Sierra Leone, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia, and Zimbabwe.