Capacity building for youth organization representatives

With a goal to strengthen the capacity of youth and youth organizations, the following workshops were organized by HOPE’87-Bangladesh:

* “Divisional Workshop on Review of the National Youth Policy”: held in the Barisal Division in cooperation with the Department of Youth Development; this workshop gave special attention to the review of the National Youth Policy of Bangladesh which was endorsed in 2003. 45 representatives from different youth organisations attended the event.

* “National Advocacy Workshop for Youth Leaders”: in cooperation with the Commonwealth Youth Programme, CYP Asia Centre, HOPE’87 arranged a 3 days workshop held at Sheikh Hasina National Youth Centre in Savar. An in-depth training with case-study presentation of different techniques of advocacy were offered. Experiences from the training and best practices of the Commonwealth countries were also shared with the participants.

* “Town Hall Meeting at UNV”: on the occasion of the International Year of Volunteers HOPE’87 organised, in cooperation with the National Youth Council of Bangladesh UNV Program, a day long town hall meeting at the UN Conference Room in Dhaka for volunteers having a strong commitment to make a real difference to development.

In this respect, HOPE’87 assisted in the meeting and development of a network to strengthen the capacity of voluntary organisations. The meeting prepared a list of recommendations regarding the necessity to develop and approve the “National Policy on Voluntarism” and to establish a National Volunteer Agency to coordinate and empower voluntary work countrywide. This recommendation was forwarded to the government for action.