Addressing the Needs and Rights of Young
People at the Policy Level
Action to address the critical challenges facing
adolescents and young people is an urgent priority if social and
economic development efforts are to succeed in alleviating poverty,
curbing the AIDS pandemic, and empowering women and men to create
a more equitable world. Investing in programmes to meet adolescents'
education, health and reproductive health needs, and to help them
build life skills, is essential to meeting these challenges.
Success will depend on:
- Advocacy on behalf of the young
- A supportive policy environment and specific policies addressing
their needs and rights
- The quality and scope of programmes
- Strong youth participation in the design, implementation and
evaluation of programmes
- Effective monitoring of progress and committed resources
Experience since the ICPD in addressing adolescent
sexual and reproductive health concerns, including HIV/AIDS, has
shown the urgency of having supportive policies in place. Yet much
progress remains to be done to have policies that fully address
the information and service needs of young people.
Advocacy is critical to gaining institutional
and public support for policy changes at many levels, including
national law, policies and regulations affecting standards of practice,
and community customs and traditions. For example, advocacy can
help shape policies and laws that mandate universal access to education,
discourage early marriage or other harmful practices, and protect
girls against sexual abuse and violence.
Restrictive policies, regulations and traditions,
on the other hand, can compromise adolescents' sexual and reproductive
health, by preventing them from acquiring needed information and
accessing lifesaving services. Laws in some countries prohibit
the provision of contraceptives to those under age 16 or to unmarried
women. Even where the law permits such services, some clinics and
health professionals do not. In other cases, fear of condemnation
may dissuade young people from seeking services or adults from
providing them. Parental or spousal consent requirements may also
restrict young people's access to reproductive health education
and services.
Political commitment — at the highest levels,
matched with resources and sustained over time — is crucial
for the success of programmes addressing these often-sensitive
issues. Many governments have taken years to come to grips with
the fact that their countries have an epidemic of sexually transmitted
infections or injecting drug use, and to the recognition that the
number of AIDS cases could explode within a decade unless much
more is done to stem their spread, including caring for citizens
already living with HIV/AIDS.
The countries most successful in reducing HIV/AIDS
are those whose leaders took the epidemic seriously over a decade
ago, including Brazil, Jamaica, Senegal, Thailand and Uganda. Involving
young people has been critical to the success of these efforts.
Other governments have more recently recognized the seriousness
of the crisis and have begun to achieve results. A few have yet
to act.
In Costa Rica, UNFPA has been supporting a broad
participatory process for the formulation of a national youth policy.
This process is noteworthy due to the high degree of youth participation — from
the municipal level up — and the support provided for this
in the policy development process. In fact, by law, the national
youth assembly is
authorized to amend and approve the final policy.
In Mongolia, a law mandating sexuality education
for every enrolled child in grades three through ten was passed,
after considerable advocacy on the part of UNFPA.
In Nicaragua, UNFPA helped to ensure that adolescents
and youth were given due attention in developing the Poverty Reduction
Strategy Papers. In partnership with UNICEF and international and
national NGOs, UNFPA facilitated a national consultation with and
about adolescents. This culminated
in the adoption of a national plan on poverty reduction and development
that took into account young people's needs.
In Armenia and Georgia, reproductive health policies
consider the rights of youth for information and services.
Read more about UNFPA support for policy and
advocacy initiatives.
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