Highlighting aspects of global climate changes

The fourteenth Conference of Youth (COY14) started on November 28, 2018, and concluded on December 1, 2018. The venue was Katowice, Poland with the participation of over 1000 participants and 500 programme contributions. International and regional youth NGOs as well as civil society actors and youngsters from 150 countries gathered to discuss climate change.

This summit provides a platform established by the United Nations Climate Change Secretariat to involve the thoughts and initiatives of young people from all over the world to contribute to the actions taken up at COP.

This time, Sajib Khandokar, Convenor, Youth Change Maker (YCM), Bangladesh, participated as a representative to shed light on the contributions made by his initiative Youth Voice at COY14. His thoughts made quite an impact at this international arena.

 "Attending the 14th Conference of Youth was a dream come true for me. To be able to present my country, especially coming from a place where youth empowerment still has a long way to go, was a privilege," he shared. "I was happy to be a part of such a platform where the young generation from all over the world has equal rights. I believe we can reconstruct the past, present, and future if we only gather enough courage to lead the way."

COY14 was one of the biggest international youth-led conferences on climate change that took place in 2018 and it provided a space to voice different opinions for enhanced and efficient climate action for youth delegates and community leaders like Sajib who represented the voice of the youth globally.

It also helped pave some important points for the UN Climate Summit in the later weeks. Apart from that, COY14 has functioned as the epitome of capacity building and youth empowerment by providing a platform for peer-to-peer knowledge sharing, discussions on how to tackle climate change challenges and a bridge connecting to more than 1300 young passionate climate leaders from over 150 nations around the world.