About Youth Forum
Consumer Rights Commission of Pakistan (CRCP) established the Youth Forum in 2002 with the aim of engaging young people in social and economic development of their communities through realizing their full potentials. This initiative includes a new dimension to traditional youth activism through its emphasis on peaceful and procedural struggle for legally enforceable rights, realization of their potentials by capitalizing on their skills, knowledge and capabilities, and by projecting their role as vibrant and responsible citizens in order that their voices are heard, respected and valued.
Objectives
To provide young people a platform to discuss, analyze, debate and articulate their concerns, expectations, aspirations, roles and responsibilities in the society
Develop and operationalise viable strategies to utilize the potential of youth for social and economic development of their communities
To promote the values of peace, tolerance, philanthropy and volunteerism among youth and educate them in rights, democracy and governance
To promote participatory sharing and networking; and establish a meaningful interface between the young people and policy makers so that their views are adequately represented
To help in developing a vision and a roadmap for the better future of youth in Pakistan, which could be taken forward both through governmental policies as well as civil society initiatives
Programmatic Focus
Youth Forum’s approach takes into account the pervasive social apathy, which has engulfed the young people and undermined their confidence and trust in governance processes. This has also deleterious effects on their abilities for improving their quality of life through organized civic engagements and initiatives. As a result, they remain socially disorganized, politically disengaged and thus absent from forums that debate and decide on critical social, political and economic issues. In this context, the Youth Forum works for articulation of problems and aspirations of the youth, and the role which they can play for dealing with key contemporary challenges. The programmatic focus rests on access to public services, especially quality education, integration of youth needs into governance and market, participation in social and economic development and promotion of peace at the community and policy levels.
Approach
The Youth Forum works by:
Articulating needs and aspirations of the youth through consultation meetings across regional and social groups and feed the output into the policy formulation process
Educating the youth on their rights, role and responsibilities in the society
Mobilizing the youth around social and economic issues and harness their potential to improve governance and market practices through a rights-based approach
Maintaining a database on youth organizations and sports clubs etc. that are operating at the national, provincial and regional levels; and facilitate their networking for the purpose of coordination, sharing of useful information, and collective learning
Facilitating exchange of information and interaction between the youth of different provinces within the country; as well as between youth in Pakistan and other Countries
Establish youth networks at regional and national level to connect young people having interests in similar areas
