The following are the outputs of the captioning taken during an IGF intervention. Although it is largely accurate, in some cases it may be incomplete or inaccurate due to inaudible passages or transcription errors. It is posted as an aid, but should not be treated as an authoritative record.
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>> Okay. Thank you, everyone, for joining us. I think fully we can start our session ‑‑ I think actually we can start our session. So yeah. I would like to thank you very much for coming especially seeing so many youth people here.
So just as a word of introduction, I would like to quickly explain the idea of this session. So we have did something similar last year in Poland at IGF forum there. And we also gave a spot to the different youth initiatives to present their current successes and they have plans for the future and also to encourage newcomers and other young people to join their work.
So this year, we wanted to do something similar. So hence the idea of this session we are having right now and today with us, we are having a very experience the young people who are already successful leaders who are very active in the Internet governance forum and in general in the field of new technologies, different aspects of new technologies for a long time.
So firstly, I would like to give the floor to Nicolas who is a computer and junior graduated from the University of the Republic of Uruguay and currently studying computer sciences. He is also a cofounder of IGF Uruguay and I saw a chapter member and also a member of youth coalition of Internet governance and he will share some words about it.
>> Hello, everyone. Welcome to our session. I am the board member of the Latin American youth governance. If you don't know what it circumstance it's the natural spaces of Dynamic Coalition and it's a natural space for all the young people to participate at the Internet governance forum. They bring their voices to the internet forum and bring participation in a meaningful way. Some of the successes we have had this year we have a very good group in the university coalition this year because we have people from all of the regions around the world. Any of the participants or the board members of the university coalition are Youth IGF coordinators. It was a good pleasure to have this year all the people in the group.ee we also have capacity building exercise with the IGF this year and the global impact. We try to be a preparatory exercise are it young people coming to the IGF this year. Very glad to be here with you. I think we have a lot of discussions about what the future challenges for the youth and what are the previous successes, right, with a lot of very good expert panelists.
>> Thank you. I would like to encourage you to get interested in its work especially the next year, there will be an opportunity to become the next steering committee members. With that, I would like to give the floor to someone else. And who is the Ph.D. candidate from the University of Venice and currently works at the European Commission. She's member of the 2022 youth organizing committee, the Youth IGF Italy and also the internet society Internet chapter. So Veronica, the floor is yours.
>> Veronica: Hello, everyone. I would like to quickly outline some of our activities super the activities of the youth sending groups. Also explaining what we do because I feel that sometimes there is a lot of confusion with the acronyms that are written to use, you know, YCAG, it's a bit confusing, you know. So youth standing group is the youth, the Internet Society. Youth standing group is the group of young people within the Internet Society and as such, our goals combined with those of the Internet Society means to safeguard the robust and safe and secure internet that is also made accessible to everyone. Additionally, the youth standing group is ‑‑ has objectives that are set by people that are usually between 18 and 35 years old. We also have members that have more holder than 35 years old, but we accept it. So membership from older people provided they also tend to have some time meet our objective and that means that they have to be particularly proactive and encourage young people, young people participation and also, you know, facilitate their participation and engagement in Internet governance issues.
There is also some confusion. We undertook a transition this year because the story of the youth sending groups is a bit complex. If you allow me, Emilia, I would like to quickly outline the youth story group and also explain one of our projects that we have ongoing. The origins of the youth standing group date back to 2015. When an informal organization called youth observe Teri was founded in Brazil originally was formed mostly by young people age 18, 15, 25 years old from different countries in Latin America and Caribbean. It was group born in Latin America and the Caribbean for young people from their region. The youth observatory was an initiative in the context of the youth at IGF in 2015 thanks to a corporation between partnership between the internet society and c GI.BR to, you know, force the participation of young people in the outer discussion of Internet governance in Latin America and the Caribbean. It was attended by 120 young people from that region. After 2016, the youth observatory received the approval of the Internet Society to become a special interest group. From that moment, it earned all the usually internet society chapter has fundings, advise and logistical support to achieve this goal. And in 2022 and during this time from 2016 to 2021, usually the logo used SIG was always combined with the logo of the youth observatory because despite having a common board, they refer two different organizations. Since from 2022, we at the Internet Society board of trustees passed a resolution which welcomed the standing group of the youths granting a more permanent start to then a special interest groups. And today, the YSG brings together around 2,000 members from every corner of the globe regardless of their age.
We have undertook close collaboration with the YCAG, whose members are present on site. Nicolas and Emilia and we have achieved so many things this year. We have understood together, you know, the working preparations of the working groups for ‑‑ to come up with a session for this IGF. We are carrying out together the mentorship phase of the IGF youth Ambassador program of the internet society. We are collaborating on the news letters as well. And so this is a very important for us to find this common fear with other organizations that in order, you know, to make the most out of this friendships and network that we carried out over time.
One of the problems that we are doing, we are working on is called youth atlas. So after the first experience of 2019 when the youth observatory mapped the participation of young people, ah, took the first step in the Internet governance worldwide. The youth standing groups also further the efforts. We want to understand what is the Legacy that is left by this first out of young people who are now young professionals and in which direction the interest is moving. What keeps the young people interested in the internet governance. We want to sum up the impact of those young people who in the past two years have paved a way to new young voices and, you know, to understand where young people want to go to you may know Joel is our Vice President there is currently in charge of carrying out interviews. And I know that he is very happy to hear this. So I'd like to invite all of you who want to be featured in the youth at last to reach out to him and get interviews because we want to know your voices. What your voices, what we will do with your voices is to, ah, to compact, to summarize all the interviews that we get into paper‑base booklet or magazine that we will distribute next year during the IGF in Japan. So we will create this magazine with pictures and interviews and impact and opinion by young people and then, you know, collect all of them and then, you know, distribute this booklet into next year IGF. We will divide the booklet into two parts. The first is destined to what I call youth veterans who are young people who have been active in internet governance based for longer than two years. They have ‑‑ they are the first nucleus of young people who paved the way for us. I can give you some names. Nicolas is one of them who you may have known. Elizabeth she was the very person who promoted the first youth summit in Berlin. Jenna was the second part for newcomers. We want to hear new voices of people that are actually interested and want to be part of the Internet governance and to hear their voices what they think, what direction they want to, you know, to follow. So get your interviews. I think it's also a fun activity to for those who are on site while for those who are online. I will share our contact in the chat and if you wish to be featured in the use atlas, you can reach out to us. You can either volunteer to be the journalist to carry out the interview and/or to be interviewed. I hope that some of you are interested in this project and you will help us out on this.
>> EMILIE SERRUGA-CAU: Thank you very much, Veronica. Joel is next to me so this is the person you can reach out to.
And now, I would like to introduce our next speaker Athena who is currently finalizing her master studies of digital transformation of organizations at AGC Montreal. She also has her own podcast which is called Teaching Time. Athena, the floor is yours.
>> Athena: I hope you can all hear me well. So I'll start by introducing you to generation Connect. So generation Connect is IT U's youth strategy and for the ones who don't know about the ITU, it's the International Telecommunication Union agency, hence ITU. And there are five different regional groups part of this youth strategy. Namely one for the African continent, the Americas and common wealth of independent states, the Arab group and Europe group that I'm part of and that I will be talking about. All of this group aimed to engage global youth as equal partners along the side of leaders today of digital change and helping young people to advance their vision of a connected future. But what does that mean concretely? What do we do in the group? Firstly, it is important to say that while ITU is the oldest UN agency, generation Connect is only two years old. So it's a work in progress. In the first year, the 1d which established the regional priorities for Europe towards 2025. I will share it in the chat afterwards if someone is interested. In the second year which is a year I joined, I worked on generation Connect European where we did you the topics like capacity development, policy, cybersecurity and I would like to say that this is how I met Veronica. But a big milestone was generation Connect global youth summit in Uranda last June. We concluded on our call to action, which was a 2‑year consultation which aims to enhance youth engagement building in what we like to call an inclusive and sustainable digital future through the participation within the participation of youth in government and wider UN system. We aim to include this call and the results of the world development conference. But this is also an example of the limitation that we faced as young initiative, which is really trying to push for young people to be part of the decision making process. And this is also something we'd like to address going past the state of generating meaningful content, but making sure that we can implement it and be part of the decision making processes. We're currently restructuring the group because basically generation Connect is for the Europe group at least is up to 25‑year‑olds. So if you are below or 25, I really encourage you to sign up or reach out to me or to actually other youths present. Hello, Max. And feel free to talk to them. You'll get much more insights. In this call for new members that will open January or February, I encourage people to join, but not only because it would look good under CV, but they're trying to bring a meaningful contribution to the table. Maybe you have an interesting expertise. Our group is very diverse. We have people with a very strong technical background and people who have a less strong technical background who are just as relevant around the table. And but as long as you come with a meaningful contribution, you have a vision for what you think this could be. Please come and share it with us. The restructuring we're doing is organized around three pillars. So policy promotion and partnerships. They're all a bit interlinked at thed of the day and we have regional priorities which are capacity development, policy and regulation, cybersecurity, environment and digital inclusion.
So if any of what I said sounds like it could interest you, please don't hesitate to reach out to me whether on LinkedIn or online, whenever you find me or other generational Connect where present is. Thank you very much.
>> EMILIE SERRUGA-CAU: Thank you, Athena. I think that generation Connect program is something very good for newcomers to get more involved into the Internet governance as presenting a lot of activities and also I will keep pointing to people. You can find Max here. He's in the green t‑shirt smiling right now who can tell you more. You can also ask Athena in the chat if you are interested in joining the generation Connect group.
And now I would like to introduce the next speaker who is my colleague from NASK. Focusing on strategic analyzes of cybersecurity. He's also a Ph.D. candidate in LAO concerning cyber crime and cybersecurity at the University of Worseile. Piotr, the floor is yours.
>> Piotr: I represent the national association institute. When it ams to Poland, NASK plays a vital and important role for programs in IG and cybersecurity. We have an experience in cyber policy land protection, cyber hygiene, cyber trainings and that is why we were able to promote the the new programs well and we were able to promote the best, I think, the most active organization. Somebody can confirm it. The youth IGF Poland that started in 2020 and has been acted in the field of Internet governance. At some point, it evolved into a vital Bart of now. Polish cybersecurity system when it comes to youth engagement. And as the most representative action for me, maybe for most of you here, it could have been observed during the last IGF in Poland. A lot of sessions were organized. I don't want to go into detail because Emilia would correctly on this one. I would certainly mistake all the numbers, but the sessions were an enormous success. I can vouch for that. And the fall, which most of you is a success that this main call of Poland was achieved. So to create an Open Forum of exchange of experience and ideas between the youth and experts from different regions and backgrounds. I think it was achieved during Poland's IGF. I am in this privileged position that angles, my colleague, she works on my team. How being gifted and being a hardworking person and also participant in this case of polish and international youth oriented programs can pay off and transcend into professional cybersecurity career. She's the best example of that. I'm really proud to work with her and I was really glad to know of all the various initiatives worldwide. Because of her, I have the pleasure to know all the initiatives around the world from Africa, from South America, from North America and this feeling that the initiatives are being a part of global network is on both international and national level can have immense impact from my perspective. This can shape the areas of IG and cybersecurity and create the platforms to cooperate between the experts and the youth, which is also very important in my point of view. From the perspective of NASK as an institution, it creates chances enables us to ‑‑ to support, help or just ‑‑ well, maybe look like we're guiding them or getting them through. We're supporting young people in transition to professional careers. So we're offering trainings. We're offering employments then, but we wanted to also include them as much as possible and provide them with resources to really turn their passion, their ‑‑ channel their passion and ideas into a meaningful real initiatives such as IGF in Poland. And I think this is the most important thing when it comes to youth oriented programs in which institutions such as NASK so the nation wide institution can help and support youth in various countries. Thank you very much.
>> Amelia: Thank you a lot, Piotr. And also I think Piotr is modest about himself because he's the best example how ‑‑
[ Laughter ]
He's the best example of how somebody so young could be so already experienced expert in cyber security like he's really a great colleague to have on the team and he's always eager to share his experience with the younger team mates like me.
So with that, I would like to get to our next speaker. Who will call bachelor of sciences in sociology and from the university of Ethiopia and who is also the founder and Executive Director of model African youth‑led initiative. He will tell us more about soon. With the agenda in 2,03, it will empower young people. He's also ‑‑ he's a fellowship of the African platform. You for human rights international advocate African leaders, Aliiance champion and delegation youth sounding board and a lot of many other outstanding accomplishments. So malako, the floor is yours.
>> Thank you very much, everyone. This is malako from underneath opennia. I would like to welcome all of you for coming here because I want to share that you have a lot of time that you invest when you come here, time and knowledge. So I would like to share on behalf of our government and youths, I think no one has done this one, but I would like to appreciate. It's a good opportunity to have you all. When you come to me, I'm Melaku. The technical team will show videos, a 1‑minute video and what I'm working on it so that we can discuss. I think it's going to be learning from each other. Thank you very much.
>> We'll be focusing on the following areas. Sustainable and growth that reduces poverty and leads to increased income levels. Equality and decent jobs. Value addition in agricultural products and growth of business and industries. Human capital development. Skills revolution in science, technology and innovation. Gender development, youth, empowerment and employment generation for youth and women. Social security and protection for all people and infrastructural development. Good governance supported by capable institutions. Manufacturing base industrialization. Promotion of culture, arts and sports. Peace and security. Let us unite to build the Africa we want. Visit WWW.AU.INT to learn more about agenda 2063. (no audio)
>> Melaku: You heard from the videos, D.C.ement work and creating a job for the youths and cybersecurity as well as security counselor, the African unit has also some departments related to cybersecurity and also the African governance. So this is mainly focusing running to the Internet governance and also controlling the cyber issues of the continent. So that's why I Kim to speak on behalf of this ‑‑ that's why I came to speak on behalf of this agenda. We dommesticate SDG and related to our objectives and the organization of the model unit. The SDG shots if we're not working as a partnership, we're not to be like ‑‑ because this the agenda is aligned with the SEBG. If we're implementing through the SGGDs, that's why we try to speak. In related to when you come in our model, so our model is the second in the continent. So the African unit is the one on behatch of the Africa unit we launch. On behalf of youth division, this is called restructure the commission, the name is called women and gender and youths directory. So this department is the one who ‑‑ to go forward. We work entirely through the African youths. It is the six regions for those who are loved Ethiopia, loved to the African and also African cultures and heritage. So you are also the sixth regions of this African unit. So it means like when I say regions, it's like as you all know, we have east African region and north, West African and but the one who is creating the more and the one who has the finance and knowledge and experience and to share with us. If we're regulating this group, so Africa is not to be achieved on the agenda as well. So the youths are the ones responsible to implement the agenda. We're trying to work on age of 15 to 35 and related to the African unit, when we come to dividing to the edge groups, the UN is already started to 29 and but the African unit also when it is mentioned or the age group 18 to ‑‑ I mean, 15 to 35. So whatever it is, we are the youths group. If we negate this age group, Africa cannot (?) on agendas thes is EG. When we mention, let's see related to our work. So, you know, when we ‑‑ it is called African Union using it. The first African unit using it. It was appointed by his excellency the commission of the African unit. It was power pillars. This has four pillars. The first is like four years. It's called education, engagement, entthship and employment. We model African Union working on those areas because when we do the models, we raise a lot of committees of the African unit. So when we related to the conference, we focus previously. We host the simulation conference related to climate change. So the outcomes was mainly use to have more ideas related to climate and digital work. We are ‑‑ the current priority issues in the world is climate. So the youths come up climate to fight this ‑‑ climate and technology how it is related to be solve it. So that's why youths are coming on behalf of this one. We would like to thank EC as well as my colleagues and partners from the UN Ethiopia. We would like to thank simulation conference engaging with the youths. This is the first one not the last, but the entirely it was recent project that we do. So related to the engagement, so the youths to have more and maybe when we have peace and security Council with the Africanune, they talk about and simulate each country as well as the UN and (inaudible) for example. If we simulate to the African unit peace and security Council. So it has its own simulation procedures. Youths have a voice because most of the time, our leaders ‑‑ more Egypt Africas. It might be inclusivity to world leaders and give opportunities for the youths. So due to that, we create this model. They used to have their own space and they keep their own talks and how to come up with a resolution. So that's why the model is working on it. So sorry. When I connected with SDG, I told you our model is not just ‑‑ it's not ‑‑ it's, ah, it's a use base initiative. Youth base and cultural heritage and also it's, ah ‑‑ sorry. So I would like to Connect our model that we dommesticated agenda SEDGs. So with three pillars. They are the three pillars social, economic and climate. So we're mainly focusing in our model. We're mainly focusing the social and environment. So when we see the social practice, there are ICBG. So, ah ‑‑ yeah. This is the economy 1. So you see ACDG1. Poverty and 0 and also sustainable community and also economic growth and industry and innovation and infrastructure. When we talk about these things, these are economical aspects of what we do. So when we do to ‑‑ so the social aspect, this is the main agenda of our model is workings focusing on this one. So we are living in digital era. We should have science and technology to create to fight. For example, as you all know, this is the one who is affecting our continent and also in Ethiopia. Most of the people have communicated with businesses. So to prevent this issue, they used to California up with a digital ‑‑ come up with a digital instrument and measuring parameters and hyper tension and other things. The administration of innovation and they are creating a platform since the charts are to have two parts in different innovation. Education is the most part as you all know. When we are in the world and we are also in a city, but most of the people saw living in rural areas, if you came into an example of Ethiopia, previously fen years ago, it is 50%. 1 in 5%. People are living (?). The rural people saw the one who affected with education. They don't have the knowledge. To avoid these challenges, these users who are learning here in CTs and different regions they can go the village where they bought. They go and they teach their ancestors or families. And that's why mainly we focus on education and equalities. As I told you, peace and security is the big issue. So this is ‑‑ that's why we are here and we are talking about the Internet. So it is related to that. Justice and also a lot of things will be affected. So as I ‑‑ why we focus the reduction and gender equality. As I told you, agenda 2063 and aspiration 6 is focusing mainly women and the youth. This is why we said women and youths are implementing this agenda. They're to make the women's ‑‑ the youths to show off the inclusivity for implementation. That's all about for social inclusion.
The last but not the least we're living in a big world and the globe is coming to us. We need what? Partnership and inclusivity and working together as a group or as a team. So if malaw cue is working in those areas, if anyone is interested, we're not mostly local and we're regional and we are also national and global. So that's why we ‑‑ most of the youths don't have a clue about the agenda 2063 as well as the SEGs. If you want to go, you can ask someone around here those who are not coming from outside. So ask someone, a youth and how many are they and also tell us like two or three. So that's why we are trying to engage in the youths and to be educated and to have national and global aspects of the agendas. Thank you. If you have a question, you are welcome.
[APPLAUSE]
>> Thank you, Melaku. We could hear insight from somebody and to learn more about the current situation here and also I think there was a lot of useful information and facts. Thank you for sharing them. There will be time for questions in a few minutes. I want to ask if we have Yoichi Iida here with us in the room. Okay. Still not. So right now, we'll proceed to the questions part.
So if you have any questions, please raise your hand or online, please write them in the chat. I will quickly ask Jenna, our online moderator if there are any questions already in the chat. Gee we currently do not have. Any thank you for making me co‑host. We don't have any questions. Please feel free to drop your question in the chat. We'll keep it in the cue. If we have enough time, we may ask you to ‑‑ we'll bring it to the discussion. Thank you.
>> Athena: Do have any questions here? Would you like to share something about your initiative? Please go ahead.
>> Audience member: Hello. Can you hear me? I'm from Nepal. My initiative name is learn IG Internet governance. With the learning Internet governance, we have developed toolkits for, you know, ICANN. We have developed toolkits for ICANN and APRGF as well as, you know, other things, stuff like that. So I strongly believe that, you know, the whole youth engagement part is very ‑‑ it's very dynamic as well as very difficult. This topic ‑‑ I'm very passionate about youth leadership. Why? Because, you know, when I started in 2007, you know, we ‑‑ I used to stand up and I used to be looked at as if I was a nobody. So from then and there, I realized we need to work on our skills. We need to work on making people especially from Asia. We have to work on their level of, you know, skills. So then and there, you know, I started engaging with the diploand then ISOC and I was involved with all these organizations. And what these days what I realized is, you know, with youth engagement, where are we going? I mean to say, you know, youth is such in a vulnerable state right now. We have to focus our energy in values. You know? That is very important. If youth are given the right values, they can stand right. They can do things right. They will be leaders. Right? And that's what we believe in and we support in. And even in Nepal, we have been, you know, we do reach out to colleges and schools and it is so that, you know, I'll show you my experience that, you know, I went to a college. There were like 70 students and I did a session. There were like 30 left. And it was a one‑hour session and within the half an hour, 13 were gone and 13 left. And out of the that time when they left, we had 10 or 15 people. Out of those 70 youth, one girl wrote a blog about it. So that is the level of engagement we get. That is a reality and we have to accept that. And it is ‑‑ it is more like, you know, we have to further work on the value system transparency, accountability and these are more, you know, issues that we have to focus on so that when they come out as leaders, they will be standing with a standard form of, you know, collaborating with the communities because a lot of the times what I have seen is, you know, I have seen IGF that are being run just for the sake of it. So I strongly believe that, you know, youth values and youth engagement and youth initiative have to be focused on the whole engagement part. This today's world is the world of opportunity, right? Have a look. You have mobile phone. You have Internet. Just go on and share that information. It is so easy. You say was it possible back then? Right? You have the knowledge. Go and talk with students and talk with your friends. That is what real engagement is. It doesn't take money. It doesn't take you to be different. It just takes you to be passionate and that passion comes from the values. Those are the values that we have, those are values where we have to work on. And then that is like, you know, to some extent, even as we focus on that, I have a (?) in IGF village. A lot of the leaders came in and we talked. And I felt very passionate with people that they share their stories and they want to be themselves. And at the time, it's just ‑‑ this, you know, far away, the ice has to be broken. You know? You just have to click and then, you know, today I encountered a lot of people that came in in our booth. And, you know, a lot of people got motivated and I even got motivated when there were students they shared that we are trying to do this. We're trying to run in. We're trying to collaborate. It's so interestings and I think this is the platform where we have to collaborate. It's not about Africa but how we're going to bring in learning from all these leaders and learning from our skills is very important that we collaborate. That's the key and thank you.
[APPLAUSE]
>> Athena: Thank you. I think it was excellent input to the discussion. Do any of our speakerses like to comment?
>> Veronica: I totally agree. I don't remember the name. I just know from Nepal.
>> Schreid IP.
>> Veronica: So what we have noticed in the university standing group is sometimes when the words gets harder, we start losing people. It happens when we carried out the working groups to develop proposal session proposal for the IGF. When at the beginning we had a lot of people coming into the working groups and starting to ‑‑ they wanted to be part of the sessions per se, but then in the was writing the proposal. So, ah, we in the end,al the beginning, we had a lot of people willing to participate. In the end, we just had people who amd to be moderators who wanted to be speakers without actually contributing to the substance of the content of this session. That is very important to keep the focus of the people on the substance of the team and not just the appearance. You know, the YCIG and the youth group brought a lot of session in this IGF. It's been a lot of work to manage all those people, all those proposals and Nicolas and Emilia knows that very well and Joel is there as well. And we at work deliver our proposal and we know that many young people that want to, you know, to do the dirty job to stay late at night and it is very difficult to find people that are really motivated to stay in this ecosystem and to work hard on that. So you can only see the appearance, the results, the discussions, the engagement, but behind that, there's been a lot of work. And we keep doing a lot of things without nobody seeing what we do. So it's very important that we also as young people we keep consideration. We are also students. We are young workers. We are finding our way into the market jobs or things like that. And, you know, some people they do this only to put this in their curriculum. But they do not actually contribute to the activities or the organization. So I agree with you that we need to foster to push our engagement, our commitment but sometimes it requires people that are motivated to do that. It is very difficult to find that.
>> Yes. Thank you. You couldn't have resonated more with me with what you said. I wanted to say that it is advice maybe. Maybe it's not my position to give advice, but I would say that the discussion should be as inclusive as possible. What I understand is the inclusive and subject. I would say that regardless of our status, I mean, whether we're here, we should be allowed to and not afraid to openly and fully discuss projects, ideas, initiatives interest to ‑‑ once more, I would say that we should bible to question authorities, question the knowledge of an expert because they are not (?). They don't know everything. We should be able to do that. Of course, it's not a call for being arrogant, but let us just be ambitious, confident, courageous, bold and let us not agree. Let's disagree in some cases. Me saying that I agree with you is quite funny, but let's disagree in some cases. Let's discuss the cases and discuss the ideas initiatives. Let us do that.
>> I would like to add something. The thing that you said is completely right. You know, the whole thing is IGF is in English. The whole proposal thing is in English. Weva the barriers here. How many of us can speak proper English? That is the thing we have to lobby. We have to make it clear that we come from different communities. You know, it is ‑‑ it has to be inclusive in such a way that youth has to be given the chance to speak their rights. Only people becoming leaders, youth leaders are leaders of today. Not tomorrow. We are leaders of today because we have the challenges. We have the problems. Having said that, it is ‑‑ I completely agree with you. It's a voluntary job. You don't get ‑‑ always get the good point on doing all the work saying people do criticize you all the time. It's the passion. It's a change. That is what is meaningful. I see all of you standing looking at me with that glaze in your eyes and that is what is important. If we don't step in, if we don't put in our effort, things are not going to change. Right? Things are not going to change. We have to do it whether they want it or whether they don't want it, we have to push it so that things for tomorrow will be a best system. There will be a better ‑‑ it is our fight. My fight. I am across 35, but I'm with you. I realize I want the leaders to come in. I wanted leaders to come in and talk about issues. IGF is such a beautiful place that you can come. You can talk about your issues. I tell that to all. I have been a mentor for a lot of the organizations, ICANN, APRIGF. I have been a mentor for IP6. So I always say be smart. Be visible. Come prepared and talk because if you voice your issues, then you get noticed. If you don't, if you treat this as your travel event, you know, we have to, we have to motivate those people. And there's a good difference in between motivation and being inspired. You know? You can just inspire a person once, but motivation is very hard. You have to constantly motivate people. All the organizations are there and instead of hearing me, let's create that resources. Let's create free Zoom account for people to hold the programs. Let's, you know, let's do it. That is what we are lacking. Let's Connect you and me Connect. Let's do a program in Poland. You call me and I'll be there. You call me in Africa, I'll be there. You call me in Uganda, I'll be there. It's that easy, that simple. But why report we doing it and breaking the ice? That is the way we change society. That is how we are going to be somewhere. We are going to be leaders because it is just like till this day, we are following people. We are following issues and that is limited us. Please, sorry.
>> Okay. Thank you. That was a very bold input. Okay. And I'm seeing a hand up. Please go ahead.
>> Hello, everyone. I'm ASHA from Maldives. This is a very, very interesting session. I'm not a write item, but I'm sure I'll be carrying these opportunities you shared with the youth because I worked with the youth community and part of the Women in Tech which is a non‑profit ocean, they focus on women and girls. There are challenges in engaging youth in especially policy making. Little bit highlighted about the kind of work that we do and then I will go straight to the question. So we actually work on developpings capacity building for youth on quoting things like digital literacy. So one of the key challenges that we face is when it comes to youth, gender studio type still exist in Maldives. Before we reach to the youth, we have to train the paramedic and the community. That is one step we have taken. Even though we are focusing on girls and women, especially areas like cybersecurity, they include capacity building for voices as well. And we have been doing this for quite a long time. It's been like four years. And what we have observed is it's very hard to engage to convince the policymakers that youth matters. Their ideas matter whether they are from a very far remote, very small population. There are things that can do in their island, small, small islands talking about size of two kilometers in an island that can be a hundred or in some cases thousands. How do you formalize plans or how do you ensure that youth voices are heard during decision making process at the national level? Thank you.
>> Thanks so much for organizing another interesting session. I will keep it short. Just coming back to you, I think there are so many passionate and motivated young leaders. I want to point that we have the resources. I still think we're lacking the resources. There are so many young leaders who are motivated and not there for (?) but for the topic. So many of you couldn't join us here. I think we should rally our own delegations and members from the countries where we're from. When I look around and there's room, it is fantastic to sit here with so many young inspiring young people, we're lacking the generation except for some, we're lacking the federation that is in charge of the resources especially when it comes to money. So I think we should try to engage them even more. While it is superb we have this discussion, I think we should not forget it is voluntary work for most of us. It's not the main interest for many to have on the CD. It is also important to end up getting a job that pays afterwards. Thank you.
>> Emilia: Thank you for the inputs. And now we will give speakers the opportunity to address them or one of them and then we will get also the other questions because I see some other hands.
>> Well, I have something to say about the resources. We don't have resources in Uruguay and we use some of the (?) we have for other organizations. We found a place in a university. There is a free room. So you put some posters and do Facebook, and adver dicement, but not the pay one. You can also collaborate with the other youths around the world to be a speaker at your session. So people will be motivated to see different faces. Those are some examples. Sorry about that. I also hear about funding and lack of funding, but it is about passion. As you say, if you have the person resources, the university facilities, you can do it. I think yes. Resources is a good thing for having booklets, more demination to become a strong thing. That is not something that blocks you to go to action.
>> Can I say something? So no. Just some quick remarks about the last intervention. I wasn't talking ‑‑ I didn't mean that young people are lazy or, you know, there is widespread problems. The fact that most of them are ‑‑ they are doing this for volunteering as a volunteer start activities and none of them, you know, tend to engage and commit their time on that. I'd like just to say that we are all ear and we are here with a great motivation to do what we do. I'm the Chair of the youth standing group. I'm the first woman to be carrying the youth standing group ‑‑ to be chairing the youth standing group. It's a job. This is a job. A spend at least 6 hours a day doing things for my organization even if this is a volunteering activity.
What I'd like to say is that youth standing groups is hoping to collaboration. As I said before, the group of young people of the Internet Society, the internet society is a number of organizations based in America in the United States and Geneva. We have funding to carry out some activities. We are open to partnership with the other youths organization and non‑youth organization in Internet governance. So I'm not there to leave you my contacts b Joe is the Vice President and, you know, you can reach out to him and we and, you know, start a partnership. I'm very open to that.
>> Thank you for your feedback. From Nepal, right? Yeah. So you said everything is okay. I mean, it's from all of us and also in Ethiopia and in Africa also the global citizen. I failed those things as well. Users in different continents are facing the same things. There might be someone in Poland and eastern Europe the same thing. So I would like to just comment on what I like to say. I was volunteering for the last 8 years. When I started I was in high school. So it was challenging like when you have been a volunteer. You should have your paying transportation to go somewhere for the concert IDs. You have people that are daily foots or whatsoever. So you maybe have something to read. So it's a lot of things. Being passionate it doesn't make you who you are. It doesn't mean that you are good. So when you have anything, like I said, passion is there, but I was committed that it was challenged. And a lot of things that are done and volunteering, I did not waste my teem time of one of my sort of my age live. So I wasted different activities. That makes me passionate. I didn't know when I go and the first convince that aye been hearing is agenda 2029. Everyone is saying agenda 26. And I read a lot of things and I have responsibilities. The leaders they give you a decision. They adjust a decision. Who would be implemented? We have to have a passion, but we had have an action on commitment. So a passion without commitment doesn't give us it. So those passions and commitment and we can be a global citizen. Thats my advice. Thank you.
>> Thank you a lot and I saw a rise of the hand on this side. Please go ahead.
>> Thank you. I am part of the Brazilian youth organization. I come from Brazil from (?). I would like to point out something related to what you mentioned. I think we have a big challenge of being heard by national policymakers. I think the fact that we're here discussing and meeting each of the is already a progress, but it's still a big challenge. But there are many factors involved includings luck, including who is the policymaker you're going to talk to and so on. But most importantly in all that, I think we cannot treat the lack of financial resources and the funding in a naive way. We need to speak what is necessary for like. We need funding and it's not only about motivation because it's easy to say that we only need motivation when we have time. We have food. Do we have family and a nice place to go to sleep, but that's not the majority of the youth and maybe this is why we cannology see many engaged university. We need to talk about the problems and, of course, it's a complex issue, but it worries me that when we start talking more about motivation and about commitment unless ‑‑ the financial means and resources that requires for us all to be here. Right? We are in Ethiopia. It was not easy for us to come here. So I wanted to point out and then completing what MALE said. I say passion, commitment, engagement, but also resources we need to keep fashion ‑‑ global bodies to keep funding youth initiatives and also Civil Society organizations that could enable youth people to participate in Internet gov innerrance. Thank you.
>> Emilia: Thank you a lot. I see two of our speakers have had their hands up. Maybe we'll take one more comment or question and I will pass the floor to our speakers.
>> Thank you. I am from Nigeria IGF. She actually said almost ‑‑ I want to speak on youth from countries. I wanted to see this stage being a youth is a very, very sensitive part of life. A huge form. Countries such as mine where I'm sorry to say, but even the internet was a big priority. So when we talk about. We have issues before we can get improve the youth engagement. I would say I'm from Nigeria. I don't think I have seen any other youth. Whip wa up know this is extremely volunteering, it is extremely hard for something that we cannot really take care of themselves to volunteer for something that is the first priority in this country. Even when you are strict like that. They're trying to bring the youth in to IGF. It is quite evident. I am the program Manager and I'm a young person. So it is good that they're trying to do this. I like tomake originallations and I would like to also discourse it. We create a pool that the youths can benefit. I mean assuming they create a poll that only the youth can benefit from when itS to Internet governance. This pool will also enable more jobs internationally and improve resources from youth form on the sad areas and ultimately improve the youth engagement. Thank you very much.
>> Emilia: Thank you a lot. Now I will pass it to Achina who has her hand up. I think we should also reflect on our way we organize ourselves. I think this is also a big challenge the way we decide to organize yourses and the way we decide to operate. The danger of replicatings conductures and are clearly feelings. I think we have a restaurant as youth as being more and very having access to technologies that will allow us to Connect. How we organize yourselves can we avoid to duplicate structures and how we can build structures with ‑‑ even having shared this opinion with other connect members, I know it is something that's not clear yet. There's not one way of achieving youth engagement and we're all pivoting and trying to make our voice heard. As we said, there are a lot of barriers, but I think sometimes the way we can organize it can be the main barriers. I hope we can share a lot of Brad practices of how we can go furler together. Thank you. Now I am passing it to Veronica who has a her hand up. We're heading to the end of the session. Please be brief.
>> Yes. Thank you. The comment was very spot on. It doesn't apply to a country like Brazil or underdeveloped country.
In terms of funding, we all have issues. I wasn't able to travel to Ethiopia because of job commitment, but also because I didn't get any travel support. Ironically, I'm not eligible to get job for report because I come from a developed country. So my question, my cost would be do we ‑‑ do we also have to consider that even young people that come from developed countries have issues. Also talking about, you know, the possibility to engage in this kind of discussions at policy level because we are at a UN event, higher level, but we need to make an impact. For me, ironically it's much more easy to be involved at this level than a national level because in Italy, they made this Council, youth ament and in Europe, you have the European Parliament, but as an Italian delegates, they always choose middle class people from ‑‑ who have studied in private schools and approval universities. Isn't that fair? Do we have the same chances to actually contribute that policy level. Do we need, you know, do we have to have the same possibilities also funding but to also ‑‑ the ability to have access to this pressure or to those events. I think the response is yes. And that's something that we need regardless of our geeeegraphical Providence. The country we were born and raised in.
>> Thank you, Veronica. I think these are really good questions which would know very hard to answer actually. We are heading to the end of our session. So unfortunately, we'll have time for just one comment and we'll have our online generator. Jenna had her hand up. Please have your brief comment.
>> Sure. I would like to highlight that this is really a filled discussion from pointing motivations and to alling the factors that you ‑‑ you're in the process of encouraging more youth participation for Internet Governance discourse. I would like to add a few comments from the dynamic coalition that I had prior to the sun. I think it's a very important message that we identify with other dineomic coalitions. In terms of the common goals and common person that we can do with other stakeholders in the iteming years. Two things that we highlight was tangible outcomes are very important. And in terms of tangible output, I believe there is lots of things that we still need to work on. Veronica mentioned about the booklet. It is leading to appoint where we are kind of catching up to other of to certain respects, you need some type of formality in order to get recognized. We have so much compared to the youth meetings three ears ago in Berlin. We have more initiative in terms of having more capacity most of us are members of the current coalition of Internet governance and I believe it's a really good platform for people like us who want to stay engaged in incurring youth engagement as well as working on the goals in achieving the area focus that we stated in IGF plus and digital compact. I highly encourage all of us to stay connected in that platform because we have that DC here don't waste it. That's it from me and thank you so much for all the other speakers as well as all the participant for your contributions. I may now pass the time back to Emilia. Thank you.
>> Emilia: I would like to close the session with saying a big thank you to all the panelists to our online moderator gena. And to the audience for being so active and for bringing so many insights on the table. I think we can have a longer discussion. There is always not enough time during the sessions of this kind. I'm really glad that we could all meet here today and have this debate. And I would also like to mention that if any of you is not in our youth group, we are sharing opportunities. Please go to Joel again. He will tell you how to be added. Thank you.