The One Young World Summit comes to Africa: by Ruth Aine

 The One Young World Summit held on African soil for the first time and Youthhubafrica’s Ugandan Correspondent, Ruth Aine was there to cover the event. Find her piece produced below and view some of her pictures from the summit here

The One young World Summit for this year was held in Johannesburg, South Africa. The Summit taking place for the first time in Africa brought together 1300 youth from 190 countries. The One Young World Summit has a format where the leading minds and voices in business, leadership and all other sectors are brought to engage with youth and encourage them to start leading. This year’s summit had amazing line up of Counselors as they are called. They included: Kofi Annan, Arianna Huffing of the Huffington Post, Sir Richard Branson, Sir Bob Gedolf, Jamie Oliver, the CEO of Unilever Paul Polman, Anthony Jenkins CEO of the Barclays Group among others. The message to the youth this year was simple and clear: Start leading. It doesn’t matter who you are, where you are at; the future of this world belongs to you.

Sir Bob Gedolf started by apologizing on behalf of his generation:” All generations fail, but my generation has failed more disgracefully than any other, for that we apologize.’ But that did not stop him from getting all tough on us. ‘All the singing, all the fun all the pomp and time spent here will mean nothing if you leave the summit without intent to change the communities that you live in.’

Kofi Annan the former secretary General of the United Nations was so generous with his time at the summit. He spoke at the Opening ceremony, and also hosted his usual #koffiannanlive google+ hangout at the summit. As the summit started put he  pust us at task of understanding the power that we yield as the youth of this generation. “Together with your colleagues you embody the talent and energy that is driving change evolution around the world. The technology you use allows you to bridge boarders, national boarders no longer contain you. You think more deeply about the future. There is good reason for your generation to think deeply about the fate of our planet. If we continue to plunder it, it is your children that will have to pay the price. We need you to stir the present generation of leaders forward, we need you to accept the mantle of leadership to drive change and to remind us all that in a globalised world, we sink or swim together.”

Later on in the summit, he raised concern over the issues that we have as the universe today. Poverty, Unemployment, Food and nutrition insecurity and climate change.  According to him, the most recent report of the Environmental commission says that human activity is making climate change much worse. “We cannot continue to exploit the resources of the world the way we are doing s if there is no tomorrow, Kofi Annan said.  On unemployment; “yes there has been growth, we see high figures, but that growth has not produced high employment and as a result it is the young people that are most affected.”  On Food and nutrition security; “it should be high on the agenda because 1 in 8 people do not get enough food to eat. With population growth & increased consumption these numbers are going to worsen. The damage done by degradation of the environment and depletion of resources; climate change is a threat to our security”

Every one of the speakers spoke with such great emotion and clarity. They admonished us to be the change that we want to see in the world and our communities. One thing was very clear through it all: we the youth are the future leaders and we need to take charge of the affairs of the universe. The present generation may not like it as Muhammad Yunus said, however: change will have to happen. We will have to take charge of the universe. And we inherit a world of poverty, disease and conflict. The onus is on us to create change; the change that will have a lasting and better impact on our children’s children. The time to start leading is now.