On Saturday, November 26, the Youth Rise Up Summit’s second day was hosted by COPPER Rose Zambia at the Mika Convention Center. Over 200 youths participated in a virtual event that kicked off the summit on Friday, May 25.
“Building Resilient Youth Through Education and Innovation” is the subject of the Summit in 2022.
Chief Operating Officer Ms. Faith Kaoma stated in her opening remarks that the Summit provided young people in Zambia with the chance to participate in the 1.8 billion Campaign in advance of the Global Forum and have their voices heard about their needs and aspirations for the present and the future they desire.
“We invite Policy makers in the room to listen to what young people want , meaningfully engage with the youth in Zambia and build long-standing cross-sectoral partnerships and alliances to ensure the services delivered to us are catered to our needs by taking into account our specific asks”.
In her speech, Chief Executive Officer Dr. Natasha Salifyanji Kaoma reaffirmed their readiness to collaborate with the government and other cooperating partners.
“I would like to humbly appeal to the Government to create more empowerment programmes to incorporate youths with different talents and skill sets. Copper Rose is prepared to work with the Government and Co-operating partners to equip youths with the skills they need to become resilient and make valuable contributions to our society. CRZ has close to 40 full time staff, more than 100 volunteers across the country, we have touched the lives of close to 100,000 young people and have a social media engagement of over 300,000 annually. We are currently the largest youth-led organization”.
With an emphasis on individual behavior change as well as systematic change in policy and practice towards a more conducive environment for youth-led and women’s development, Copper Rose employs a comprehensive strategy that involves reaching out to in-school and out-of-school youths, including young women. The group strives to construct a network of young leaders with the assistance of volunteers, assisting them in advancing in their careers and serving as champions of youth-led development. Additionally, CRZ increases the ability of other organizations so that they can work with and for young people more successfully and may be more sensitive to the needs of women in their work and policy.
Adolescent HIV rates are the highest among those living with HIV, according to Dr. Angel Mwiche, director of the reproductive health unit for the Ministry of Health. The Ministry is putting in place health facilities with the goal of offering services that are kid-friendly to assist reduce adolescent health issues.
“There are a lot of opportunities to change this narrative such as free education and campaigns to end early child marriages”.
Additionally, he mentioned that 29% of all pregnant women are teenagers.
Dr. Mwiche concluded by saying that he was pleased to attend the 2022 Youth Rise Up Summit because it gives the Ministry of Health a chance to hear directly from teenagers about how to solve difficulties they encounter.
