Half the planet, one voice

– December 13, 2011

From the colourful national costumes to the excited babble of many different languages spoken at once, the UNEP Tunza International Children and Youth Conference represented humanity at its most diverse and its most unified. These 1,400 young people from 118 countries gathered in Bandung, Indonesia, from 26 September to 1 October 2011, to discuss the state of the planet and ways to take an active role in shaping their future during the run-up to the United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development – Rio+20.

Through plenaries and workshops – many facilitated by children and youth themselves – the Tunza conference gave participants the opportunity to discuss Rio+20’s themes: international environmental governance, sustainable development and the green economy, as well as learn how to make their voices heard.

The message of the conference was clear: young people, who make up half the world’s population, stand to lose the most if the world continues on a growth trend that is out of line with what the planet can sustain. Many youth are already experiencing the effects of food and water shortages, pollution and climate change in their own countries; meanwhile around 40 per cent of the world’s unemployed are between 15 and 24 years old.

Yet, as UNEP Executive Director Achim Steiner noted in his opening address, young people are in a good position not just to call for change, but to take part in creating it. ‘The older we become, the more we find reasons why things can’t be done,’ he said. ‘Tunza is about allowing you to see you are not alone, and that nothing has to be as it always has. It’s people who change what happens in government, so you have great power.’