...:: [Youth for Habitat

Brief Description:

The project will strengthen the ICT use capacities of local youth platforms that are established through Turkey’s Local Agenda 21 Program. The project will train local youth platforms to become active users of the existing Local Agenda 21 e-Governance Web Portal and train a selected group of young people to become employable in the IT sector.

I. SITUATION ANALYSIS

Local Agenda 21 (LA-21) National Program of Turkey is an important local democratization project of Turkey, implemented and coordinated by United Nations Development Program and the Regional Section for International Union of Local Authorities East Mediterranean and Middle East (IULA-EMME) since 1997. The over

all objective of the program is to strengthen local governance by ensuring that civil society participates in decision-making in planning and influences local investments to meet priorities. The program, currently encompassing over sixty cities, reflects a decentralized and enabling approach, based upon networking and collaboration among equal partners. The primary decision-making and implementation mechanisms are the local stakeholders organized mainly in the form of city councils supported by working groups, women and youth councils, and platforms of children, elderly and disabled.

Within the scope of the Local Agenda 21 Project, local youth platforms have been established in sixty cities throughout the country. These platforms raise aw

areness on youth related issues, encourage youth participation in decision-making and create an inclusive platform for people of different backgrounds to come together and share common values. Youth Association for Habitat facilitates the Local Agenda 21 National Youth Parliament Network.

The LA-21 National Youth Parliament declared its establishment at the end of the Summit organized between the dates 18-21 May 2004 with the pa

rticipation of 297 delegates and observers from 75 diverse provinces. Prior to the Summit, within the period of 2003-2004 a dynamic and participatory process took place. The LA-21 National Youth Parliament is based on democratic civil participation and constitutes a basis in determination, preparation and efficient implementation of national youth policies and programs.

Half of Turkey’s population is in the 0-24 age bracket. Eighteen percent of Turkey’s present 71.7 million people is in the 15 to 24 age group. This demographic profile combined with information on employability and income suggests that Turkey’s youth, especially those in the country’s less developed regions, do not enjoy the cultural and intellectual opportunities available to th

eir peers in other countries. Platforms for youth empowerment, such as those supported under Turkey’s LA-21, are therefore of critical importance in terms of drawing attention and local action to the problems of youth.

Despite Turkey’s young population, computer and Internet usage is still not as prevalent as in the developed world. Turkey has very few cases where the internet and advanced communication technologies have been effectively utilized for advocacy and public action. The main reason for this is lack of opportunities that young people have in order to enhance or build their IT skills. This lack results in limited opportunities for the youth to partic

ipate in decision making, to network with other youth associations and to build skills for better access to job opportunities.

It is widely recognized that youth activities and involvement are essential to the success of the LA-21. Therefore, it is important to focus on young people, especially those who are unemployed and are from the disadvantaged provinces of Turkey. This is the target group of this project. The project aims to establish the mechanisms to capacitate youth groups in selected provinces in order to prevent them from being excluded in the employment sector. It will also increase IT skills in youth groups would directly contribute to the effectiveness of the local governance incentives with better utilization of the Local Agenda 21 e-Governance Web Portal.

UNDP Country Cooperation Framework – CCF (2001-2005) identifies Governance and Decentralization as one of the two main cooperation areas of UNDP in Turkey with particular focus on promoting transparency, efficiency and effectiveness of public sector services and underlines the importance of ICT as a major tool to foster good governance.

The UN Development Assistant Framework (UNDAF) Turkey (2006-2009) also highlights the importance of ICT for development in the country program output 1.1.3 mentioning the achievement target for the enhancement of access to information and participation through effective utilization and diffusion of ICT technologies.

In addition, due to high importance of the matter, the theme for the National Human Development Report (NHDR) of Turkey for 2004 was chosen as “ICT and Human Development.” The NHDR highlights the key role that ICT can play as an effective tool in helping to achieve Turkey’s development goals, and to help inform the process of strengthening the role of ICT in a manner that fosters an open information society. The analysis in the report identifies entry points for ICT to bridge the digital divide in Turkey and opportunities that ICT can bring to Turkey’s advancement of democratic governance, poverty reduction, and a strengthened education system.

The efforts for the advancement of ICT for development need to be complemented by the implementation of strategies based on a multi-stakeholder approach and innovative partnerships to expand dialogue and connect people to development situations. Therefore the institutional framework has been built around a multi-stakeholder partnership with responsibilities defined for each institution as below:

Youth Association for Habitat is an international youth network working in partnership with the United Nations, established during the 1995 Copenhagen Social Development Summit with the participation of 300 youth organizations with diverse religious, racial, cultural and national backgrounds. The organization is serving as the Secretariat of Youth for Habitat International Network. Its main mission is to increase youth awareness for sustainable development and livable environment, youth participation in decision making; to develop partnerships among youth; to enable youth to establish partnerships with the governments, local authorities and the private sector; to follow up and increase the participation of youth in the international youth related events of the United Nations and the European Union; to improve networking among youth groups and to develop training programmes.

The organization is facilitating the youth work of Local Agenda 21 and coordinating the South Eastern Anatolia Social Development Project for Youth.

The local youth platforms have been established in the majority of partner cities of LA-21. These platforms raise awareness on youth related issues, encourage youth participation in decision-making and create an inclusive platform for people of different backgrounds to come together and share common values. Special youth programs to accommodate the needs of the youth have been launched in various partner cities. The local youth platforms that will be included in the project are the ones in Mardin, Trabzon, Kars, Malatya, Elazığ, Bitlis, Çanakkale, Denizli, Yalova, Konya, Antalya, Adana, Yozgat, Bolu, Ankara, and Istanbul. These cities were selected on the basis of representation of 16 NUTTS-II level sub-regions of Turkey, which have technical facilities in forms of operational youth centers or IT centers to utilize as training units.

The primary responsibility for developing and implementing Local Agenda 21 action plans in Turkey lies with municipalities whose jurisdiction is limited to urban areas and to settlements with more than 2,000 inhabitants. The Municipal Law empowers municipalities with responsibility for taking any and all necessary measures for the health, well-being and welfare of the population of their localities.

Microsoft Turkey Office has been in cooperation with the UNDP Turkey Office and the Youthforhab for the empowerment of IT skills of youth in Turkey. The Youthforhab and Microsoft Turkey Office have also come to a mutual agreement for the implementation of online education for youth to enhance and build their IT skills, which strengthens the sustainability of this project.

The primary direct beneficiaries of the project will be the members of the Local Agenda 21 youth platforms in sixty cities and the representatives of the Local Agenda 21 National Youth Parliament.

16 regions of Local Agenda 21 Youth Platforms were selected as project target locations. These regions are organized according to the NUTTS II classification of the European Union. Accordingly, every region has a facilitator city selected from the region. They will be namely Mardin, Trabzon, Kars, Malatya, Elazığ, Bitlis, Çanakkale, Denizli, Yalova, Konya, Antalya, Adana, Yozgat, Bolu, Ankara, and Istanbul.[1] Responding to this, the estimated annual number of people to be reached and trained are 1600 (100 people from each region). 32 first trainers, including 2 trainers from each region will be trained as multipliers. These trainers will train young people increasing up to 100 people in their respective cities. Basic computer facilities exist in the project cities either at the disposal of the youth platforms or at Local Agenda 21 secretariats.

In addition to this, the project will also play a major role in the strengthening of IT sector in project target regions. Therefore, the ultimate beneficiaries of the project will be the local communities which will find new employment opportunities as the IT sector moves in at the local level.

II. Strategy:

While it is true that ICT capacity building can play an important role to empower youth for their improved participation in e-governance systems and for their better access to job opportunities, improper strategies have the risk to widen the digital divide within the country. The strategy to harness the potential of ICT for youth is built on two major activities:

1) The first activity focuses on the “Training of Trainers”. In this part, the main purpose is to create a local IT trainers team from the target group. The creation of the trainers team will also encourage peer education especially at the local level. The selected Local IT Trainers Team will consist of 2 trainers for each project target region. This makes a total of 32 young trainers. The team will then be providing IT training to about 1600 people; 100 from each target region.

2) As the second activity and following up to the trainings that will be conducted, the project will provide the opportunity to bring unemployed young people trained on IT skills and private sector based on IT together through Career Days which will be organized at the end of each training. In addition to that, a link to the LA21 e-Governance web portal will be added in which the CVs of trained young people will be posted. Through these well-trained young people, the IT sector in the project target regions will be strengthened.

The key element in the implementation of the project is to maintain the sustainability of the training programs and knowledge transfer as a part of the overall framework activities of the local youth platforms. The Project foresees a peer education model where the know-how of the included training programs are transferred to the local youth councils. When the know-how is present at the local level, then the training programs can be sustained at the local level with modest funding. This project strategy will also trigger transfer of know-how within the LA21 youth network from the project beneficiary target regions to other regions as an integral part of the youth’s networking activities.

III. Management Arrangements:

The project will be executed by the Youth Association for Habitat (Youthforhab), which will be the responsible agent for the management of the Project. Youthforhab will carry all administrative, technical, financial and secretarial functions.

The project will be coordinated by the Director of Youthforhab.[2] He will be fully responsible for the coordination of the project and to ensure the intended outputs that are achieved within their timetable. He will consult and cooperate with the UNDP Governance Programme Manager and Programme Associate for the success and the realization of the project accordance with the expectations of UNDP. The project will be managed by a project manager who will work for Youthforhab.[3] There will also be a Project Steering Committee (PSC) which will provide assistance and support during the implementation of the project.[4]

Youthforhab will facilitate, guide and coordinate all relations with the local youth committees. Youthforhab will contact all governors, and majors within the target regions.

IV. Monitoring and Evaluation:

The monitoring and the evaluation of the project will be carried out in accordance with the principles and procedures designed by UNDP. To fulfill this purpose the following are needed:

Quarterly Progress Reports: Youthforhab will prepare Quarterly Progress and Financial Reports for this project.

Annual Progress Reports: Youthforhab will submit an Annual Project Report to UNDP at the end of the year. This report will be a comprehensive one that assesses the performance of the project.

The project will be monitored by the Project Steering Committee, which will meet 4 times a year to examine the implementation of the project.

The project will be audited, in line with the UNDP audit requirements, once in its lifetime at a minimum. Adequate financial provisions for the audit are included in the project budget.

V. Legal Context

The project document shall be the instrument envisaged in the Supplemental Provisions to the Project Document, attached hereto. The host country-implementing agency shall, for the purpose of the Supplemental Provisions to the Project Document, refer to the government cooperating agency described in the Supplemental Provision.

The following types of revisions may be made to this project document with the signature of the UNDP Resident Representative only, provided he or she is assured that the other signatories of the project document have no objections to the proposed changes:

(a) Revisions in, or addition of, any of the annexes of the project document (with the exception of the Standard Legal Text for non-SBAA countries which may not be altered and agreement to which is a pre-condition for UNDP assistance).

(b) Revisions which do not involve significant changes in the immediate objectives, outputs or activities of a project, but are caused by the rearrangement of inputs already to or by cost increases due to inflation; and

(c) Mandatory annual revisions, which rephrase the delivery of, agreed project inputs, or reflect increased expert or other costs due to inflation, or take into account agency expenditure flexibility.

[1] See Annex IV.

[2] See Annex I

[3] See Annex II

[4] See Annex III