Dear friends and colleagues,
the past months have shown in even greater clarity that sustainable development has distinct digital aspects. We cannot separate the struggle for climate action and environmental sustainability from the use and governance of the Internet. Both are global efforts that can only succeed if we find ways of effective multi-stakeholder cooperation.
Young people play a vital role in advocacy – both for environmental changes, and for a fair, inclusive Internet. Last year, we at the German Informatics Society were able to network over 100 youth representatives from all world regions in the Youth Internet Governance Forum Summit, the outcomes of which can be found in our report.
This year, we want to bring these two advocacy streams together in one policy development process. Youth4DigitalSustainability aims to gather young experts, activists, and organisations who are interested in the following key topics and want to collaborate on policy development regarding:
• Greening the Internet
• Fair Digital Businesses
• Internet for Social Cohesion
• Sustainable Governance of the Internet
For each key topic, a transdisciplinary, international working group of young people will collaborate in order to draft policy recommendations to be presented to the United Nations Internet Governance Forum and other fora.
This is where you can get active! We call to all interested individuals ages 16 to 30 to submit their expression of interest to participate in a working group until July 19, 23:59 Central European Summer Time.
More information and the application form can be found here: https://yigf.de/events/youth4digitalsustainability-program-2020/
Please feel free to share this call to your respective communities. We are looking forward to expressions of interest from young people in different world regions and with diverse backgrounds.
We are active on Twitter, where all relevant updates will be shared.
We’d be delighted to work with you on these important issues!
- Elisabeth for the Organising Team
