Over 60 representatives of national youth non-governmental organisations from different provinces of South Africa attended a National Youth NGO conference to look into issues affecting non-governmenal organisations involved in youth development in their quest to deliver quality services to their clientele.
The conference, held at the Kopanong Hotel and Conference Centre in Benoni from march 30 – April 2 was organised by the Youth Development Network (YDN) in conjunction with the National Development Agency (NDA) and the South African Non-Governmental Organisations Coalition (SANGOCO).
The conference with the theme “Strengthening and creating space for youth NGOs in South Africa” looked into different issues affecting the sector in the country and how best the situation can be improved.
The conference brought together youth NGO practitioners, funders, the private sector and government officials involved in youth development to ensure that the issues all the sectors have an input on the issues being discussed.
The meeting conference came out with very important resolutions aimed at professionalisation of the work of youth NGOs in the country.
Below are the conference key resolutions:

• To embark on a massive capacity building programme for youth NGO’s
• To re-position youth NGOs in terms of the professionalisation of youth work
• Youth NGOs should position themselves to partner with NYDA on programmatic basis.
• To create a continuous effective platform for advocacy and lobbying on behalf of the youth sector
• To develop youth programmes that can attract private sector support without compromising the needs of young people
• To develop a code of conduct for youth NGO’s
• To facilitate the establishment of a Youth Development Charter
• To lobby for the ratification of the African Youth Charter
• DSD needs to support SAYWA so that it can execute its role in mobilisation of youth workers for professionalization
• Youth NGOs need to play a critical role in strengthening SAYC and SAYWA
• To have a continuous engagement with funders (government, private and foreign) in order to resuscitate the relationship with them
• To establish a Youth NGOs Co-ordinating Mechanism/structure with a view to strengthening  and creating space for Youth NGOs; and that Youth Development Network and South African NGO Coalition take the lead in establishing this body with the following responsibilities:
• Consult with other relevant stakeholders in the process
• Look at the modalities and the framework of the coordinating structure/mechanism
• Explore methods of mobilizing the sector throughout the country.

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