Youth workshop to influence Post-2015 Development Agenda

The Post-2015 Development Agenda refers to a process led by the United Nations that aims to help define the future global development framework that will succeed the UN Millennium Development Goals, a set of eight global development targets which come to an end in 2015. The workshop will aim to devise key strategies and tactics to influence the Post-2015 Development Agenda at a national, continental and global level and is described as a critical step in a campaign initiated by African Monitor, called Voice Africa's Future.

The initiative has used mobile technology and social media in six African countries as well as an offline platform in four African countries to generate the perspectives, aspirations and key concerns of youth in the continent about the future they want to see.

Launched in 2012 by African Monitor from the premise that it was important to create platforms for ordinary citizens to influence and shape the global development agenda, Voice Africa's Future has collected critical data which has provided impetus for advocacy at

• national level in consultations with the United Nations and local governments;
  
• at continental level as part of the African Union process to generate a Common African Position on post-2015 and at the Africa Civil Society Organisation's working group on post-2015; and at
  
• international level through various interactions with global civil society organisations and other structures of the United Nations.

The workshop is aimed at increasing the exchange and interactions between the youth from all over the continent and to develop a standard work plan that can be implemented by the campaign's youth champions and the various countries' national focal points.

In addition, it will forge a common position around the Post-2015 Development Agenda, provide training on advocacy and produce an advocacy work plan.

Some of the topics to be discussed will be updates on the post-2015 process at country level, mobilising financial and strategic resources to advance advocacy around the post-2015 agenda, media and communication tools to promote youth voices and creating mass youth mobilisation.