National Youth Service – ‘Proud to Serve’ Volunteer Campaign

The National Youth Service (NYS) Volunteer Campaign is an annual initiative spanning two months (December/January) to celebrate the year-round contributions young people make to their communities’ voluntary service. The campaign was launched by Deputy President Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka in 2006, and was successfully implemented during the 2006/07 holiday period in which more than 9 000 youth participated in various activities throughout the country.

In responding to the President’s call to enrol 10 000 young people to deliver volunteer services to their communities for the 2007/08 campaign, the dplg (through its Youth Development and HIV/Aids directorate) in partnership with municipalities and other government organisations, has planned several events which incorporate a Youth and Infrastructure Summit to be held within the first quarter of the year. The activities of the dplg and its partners will be rolled out across five provinces.

The campaign will be targeting the following priority areas:

• Environment and nature conservation (lean up campaigns)
• Renovating of parks
• HIV/Aids awareness campaign
• Agriculture
• Community gardening
• Infrastructure (renovation of community centres)
• Community safety (this includes activities such as safety and security and education in fire prevention)
• Arrive alive campaign
• ‘Back to school’ campaigns

The activities that will be undertaken are informed by the NYS underlying theme: ‘Proud to Serve’. This essentially means that young people become engaged in activities that seek to empower them, whilst leveraging their energies and resourcefulness for the development of their communities. This participation also empowers them with enabling tools and skills to help them cope with the challenges they face as youth.

National Youth and Infrastructure summit
The dplg in partnership with the National Youth Commission (NYC) and South African Local Government Association (SALGA) will be convening the Youth and Infrastructure Summit in partnership with a spectrum of organisations within the public and private sectors. The aim of the summit is to engage young people to be active participants at local government level in ensuring delivery of infrastructure within their communities. The summit is planned to take place on 17 and 18 March 2008. The objectives of the summit are:

• Strengthen the understanding of the role of the youth in the decision making processes such as IDP and local government participatory structures on infrastructure provisioning and service delivery
• Share how the youth could benefit from infrastructure provision and service delivery
• Emphasise the demand for rare technical skills with the youth to, amongst other things, ensure the sustainable infrastructure delivery for future generations
• To confirm the contributions for some key stakeholders such as the private sector towards the development of the youth

The summit is aimed at achieving the following key outcomes:

• To facilitate youth participation in the IDP processes
• To ensure youth participation and representation in local government participatory structures.
• To get commitment from municipalities, provincial local government departments and SALGA to involve the youth in decision making processes
• Clear understanding of service delivery with specification of infrastructure at municipal level
• Ensure youth development is mainstreamed at local government level by assisting municipalities to fast track the establishment of the local youth units
• Youth to be at the forefront of the delivery of infrastructure in their municipalities which will ensure employment and skills transfer/development

Contact the dplg
Tel: +27 12 334 0600
Fax: +27 12 334 0603