Matereti Sarasau
Sukanaivalu
1 Timothy 4:12 “Let no man despise thy youth; but be thou an example of the believers, in word, in conversation, in charity, in spirit, in faith, in purity”.
2. According to the World Youth Report
(2020), there are 1.2 billion young people aged 15 to 24 years, accounting for
16 per cent of the global population
3. Youth in Fiji are defined as those between the ages of 15 and
35 years which constitute about 32 percent (285,000) of the total population based on the 2017 population census.
Reflections:
Our
Youth have been at the receiving end of poor leadership and a lack of sound
decision making from the homes, communities, schools, religious institutions,
local government institutions and the national government which has resulted in
the increase in the following social issues:
1)
School
dropouts,
2)
Child
labour,
3)
Youth
unemployment,
4)
Delinquency,
5)
Drugs
and substance abuse,
6)
Teenage
pregnancy,
7)
Prostitution,
and
8)
Other
illegal activities
Corruption: Corruption
is dishonest behavior by those in positions of power. Those who abuse their
power may be individuals or they may belong to organizations, such as
businesses or governments. Corruption can entail a variety of actions,
including giving or accepting bribes or inappropriate gifts, double-dealing,
and defrauding investors. Corrupt behavior is often the result of government
intervention in the economy but it can be prevented with certain checks and
balances.
Youth for integrity, innovation and
lifelong learning: towards a fair and corruption-free society
17 December 2021
·
Young people now play a crucial role in building a more just,
equitable, resilient and sustainable world, an essential part of which involves
countering corruption.
Young people are just as affected by corruption as others in
society. Corruption can affect their prospects for a decent future and
employment as well as impeding access to education, health care and other basic
services. Corruption is stealing their future, so the world’s 1.8 billion
young people have a major stake in countering it.
Youth can be drivers of changes in attitudes and behaviour, and it
is in the interests of decision-makers to harness young people’s energy, ideas
and power of mobilization. And around the world, young people are playing a
crucial role in developing and implementing innovative, creative
anti-corruption efforts.
In many places youth-led civil society organizations and
individuals are providing a unique contribution in preventing and countering
corruption. Many young people from these organizations came together at the
virtual Youth Forum in May 2021. The Youth Forum’s statement was delivered to the
UN General Assembly Special Session against Corruption (UNGASS) in June 2021 by
Serena Ibrahim, Founder of Youth against Corruption, Lebanon, who said there is
no more time for business as usual and delivered 10 key requests for creating a
future with zero tolerance for corruption.
Corruption is not the only factor affecting young people’s future
prospects. The COVID-19 pandemic has hurt young people who have experienced an
unprecedented disruption in education, employment, social interaction, and
their ability to discover the world. They now play a crucial role in building a
more just, equitable, resilient and sustainable world, an essential part of
which involves countering corruption. Young people are also seeking
accountability from leaders for decisions made in COVID-19 responses, to
strengthen institutions and the rule of law through transparency and
anti-corruption measures.
Education and youth
To effectively promote a culture of integrity and build a
generation that stands for resilience to corruption, education is key. Working
with children in a classroom setting at an early stage in their educational
development can provide them with the knowledge and skills necessary to
understand how to react when confronted with corruption and unethical
behaviour. From an early age, children can be taught about the ethical
standards to be expected of both the public and private sectors. In addition,
children can learn that criminal justice systems should be fair, just and
humane. Through such an early learning approach, the views of corruption can be
gradually challenged and changed.
Young people can help to promote integrity and be powerful agents
of change by developing innovative and impactful solutions within their
communities, with support from decision makers.
At the Conference, the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) will
be launching a new global initiative focused on youth education, GRACE. The
initiative aims to empower the next generation to act with integrity and be
less tolerant of corruption and unethical practices.
GRACE, the Global Resource for Anti-Corruption
Education and Youth Empowerment, will help Member States to incorporate anti-corruption,
integrity and ethics into national education curricula for primary and
secondary schools. It will promote teaching and research at the tertiary
level with grants to universities and academic institutions, anti-corruption
summer schools for students and a global anti-corruption fellowship programme.
It will establish a youth advisory board of youth ambassadors to enable young
people to provide their perspectives and insights on tackling corruption.
The GRACE Initiative builds on UNODC’s earlier projects, Education
for Justice (E4J), which sought to prevent crime and promote a culture of
lawfulness through education activities designed for primary, secondary and
tertiary levels and the Anti-Corruption Academic initiative.
Meaningful youth engagement in anti-corruption
The “YouthLED” Integrity Advisory Board being set up by the GRACE
initiative will bring together a group of 16 talented young people, working to
advance education and youth empowerment as a key tool to prevent and fight
corruption locally, regionally and globally.
YouthLED will support GRACE in advancing its four cross-cutting
principles – partnerships, innovation, gender and youth, by engaging with young
people in their respective countries and regions, as well as globally;
advocating for the GRACE initiative within their communities to disseminate
good practices and experiences of anti-corruption education; and provide
training and learning opportunities on GRACE tools and resources.
By establishing YouthLED, UNODC will help youth to realize their
rightful and decisive role in the making of policies that will concretely
affect their future, harness young people’s ideas and perspectives and
meaningfully integrate them within UNODC’s anti-corruption youth-related work.
Technology and youth
Young people across the world are at the forefront of mobilizing
technology for the common good. To leverage this, UNODC has been hosting a
series of hackathons, or coding challenges, most recently in Africa.
The “Coding4Integrity” hackathon in October brought together the
talent and skills of 200 young developers from five African countries - Egypt,
Kenya, Nigeria, Senegal and South Africa - who worked on innovative tech
solutions that can help to curb corruption.
The young developers in 65 teams had to come up with their own
ideas on how to counter corruption through technology using Artificial
Intelligence, Blockchain Dapp Development or Web2 Development. Each of the 65
teams chose a single thematic area such as transparency in public
administration or in public procurement and the administration of public
finances, safe and reliable reporting of corruption and financial
investigations.
The five winning country teams, Team Valoro from Egypt, Team
Enigma from Kenya, Team STEM from Nigeria, Team Fisk from Senegal and Team
Blockchain Bulls from South Africa, will unveil their projects at the
Conference in Sharm El-Sheikh.
The Coding4Integrity hackathon represents one very impactful way
in which GRACE is promoting the union between digital innovation and social
entrepreneurship as a gateway to meaningfully empower young people to take
action against corruption.
Looking to the future
The way society views and addresses corruption can be
revolutionized if young people are involved in the planning, design and
implementation of anti-corruption frameworks, tools, and policies at the
national and international levels.
There is much to be gained from engaging young people in the fight
against corruption and intergenerational collaboration is fundamental to
achieving solidarity, transparency, accountability, and trust among States,
people and generations as we aim to end corruption.
A
Call to integrity – World Youth Alliance
Youth are often referred to as the hope of the nation and
the leaders of tomorrow, but have we ever thought of youth as those
that give us a call to integrity?
During the Commission on Social Development, I participated in the
event, Empowering Youth for Sustainable Development, led by the UNDP and filled
with the voices and ideas of youth delegates and organizations from around the
globe. One such youth delegate commented on the prevalence of corruption in
many governments in his continent of Africa, albeit in varying degrees. He
highlighted how the youth of his continent and throughout the world
consistently cry out against this corruption. The opposite of corruption is not
just good governance. That merely scratches the surface. What is being voiced
is a petition for honesty, transparency, and accountability—a plea for
integrity.
However, the youth delegate didn’t stop at the need for government
reform, but more significantly emphasized that one must have integrity within
oneself before challenging others to have integrity. Herein lies the crux of
the issue: in order to create and maintain a government, a political climate,
of integrity, you must begin with yourself, adhering firmly to moral and
ethical principles (integrity as defined by Merriam-Webster dictionary).
A renewal of government essentially implies a renewal of culture.
Where does a renewal of culture begin? It can only begin with the individual,
with the transformation of each human person. Filled with a natural
optimism and hope in the future and the individual, youth inherently sense that
man’s happiness and development is intrinsically linked to the moral and
ethical principles upon which his life, his society, his world is built upon.
A true sustainable human development thus ought to begin by this
transformation of culture voiced by youth: this appeal to create a society of
moral principles that is built one honest person at a time. The debate on human
development must become a “conversation about personal goods and the common
good, about the relation between freedom and moral truth, about the virtues
necessary to form the kind of citizens who can live their freedom in such a way
as to make the machinery of {government} serve genuinely humanistic ends”
(George Wiegel, Two Ideas of Freedom)
By Lenore Healy, Intern at WYA HQ, New York.
Integrity:
1.
firm adherence to
a code of especially moral or artistic values : INCORRUPTIBILITY
2. an unimpaired condition: SOUNDNESS
3. the quality or state of being complete or undivided: COMPLETENESS
INTEGRITY implies
trustworthiness and incorruptibility to a degree that one is incapable of being
false to a trust, responsibility, or pledge
(Merriam-Webster Dictionary)
By the Mindtools content team
Many of us have to
make decisions that define who we are and what we believe in. Most often, the
choices we face may seem insignificant. But this doesn't mean that they're not
important to us: even the smallest action can have an impact on our self-respect,
our integrity, and, ultimately, our reputation.
In a world where
headlines are often dominated by people who make the wrong choices, people who
make the right ones can seem to be rare. However, it feels good to live and
work with integrity and, when we become known for this highly valued trait, our
lives and our careers can flourish.
Having integrity means that you are honest,
ethical, and follow defined moral principles. And integrity at work is about
even more than honesty and respect. If an organization has a true culture of
integrity, that means employees take their commitments seriously, are proactive
when they don’t understand their responsibilities, and ultimately, are
accountable for their results. As a result, the business thrives.
https://www.mindtools.com/ai9794o/how-to-preserve-your-integrity
Elizabeth
Perry, 2022
What is
integrity? Definition and meaning
Integrity means being honest and having
strong moral principles. A person with integrity behaves ethically and does the
right thing, even behind closed doors.
For instance, informing a cashier that they
gave you too much change or going back to the store to pay for something you
forgot to pay for are two examples of showing integrity in everyday
circumstances.
7 traits
associated with integrity
Integrity may seem like a vague concept. If
you want to encourage integrity at your workplace and live it out for yourself,
you might need a more concrete definition. One of the best ways to understand
this concept is to look at the traits associated with integrity.
Here
are the 7 most common traits that a person with integrity shows:
1.
Expressing gratitude for
others
2.
Valuing
honesty and openness
3.
Taking
responsibility and accountability for your actions, good and bad
4.
Respecting
yourself and others around you no matter where you are
5.
Helping
those in need without sacrificing your own health
6.
Demonstrating
reliability and trustworthiness
7.
Showing
patience and flexibility, even when unexpected obstacles show up.
https://www.betterup.com/blog/integrity-in-the-workplace
Green Economy: According to UNEP A green economy is defined as low carbon, resource efficient
and socially inclusive. In a green economy, growth in employment and income are
driven by public and private investment into such economic activities,
infrastructure and assets that allow reduced carbon emissions and pollution,
enhanced energy and resource efficiency, and prevention of the loss of
biodiversity and ecosystem services.
These green investments need to be
enabled and supported through targeted public expenditure, policy reforms and
changes in taxation and regulation. UN Environment promotes a development path
that understands natural capital as a critical economic asset and a source of
public benefits, especially for poor people whose livelihoods depend on natural
resources.
The notion of green economy does not
replace sustainable development, but creates a new focus on the economy,
investment, capital and infrastructure, employment and skills and positive
social and environmental outcomes across Asia and the Pacific.
Green
Skills:
According to UNIDO Simply put, green skills are
the knowledge, abilities, values and attitudes needed to live in, develop and
support a sustainable and resource-efficient society.
The
need to transition towards more environmentally sustainable modes of production
and consumption has become imperative, for developed as well as for developing
countries.
·
Sustainable Development
Goal 9 includes the target
of upgrading infrastructure and retrofitting industries to make them
sustainable, with increased resource-use efficiency and greater adoption of
clean and environmentally sound technologies and industrial processes by 2030.
·
Sustainable Development
Goal 12 includes
the target of achieving the sustainable management and efficient use of natural
resources by 2030.
The
transition to a low-carbon, resource-efficient economy requires systemic
changes that will result not only in new products and services but also in
changes in production processes and business models.
This
greening of the economy will inevitably change the skills required and the
tasks involved in many of the existing occupations.
There
are three main ways in which the transition to a green economy affects needed
skills:
·
structural
changes lead to increased demand for some tasks and a decrease for others;
·
new
economic activity will create new occupations and there will be a need for new
skills profiles, qualifications and training frameworks;
·
many
existing occupations and industries will experience greening changes to tasks
within their jobs, and this will require adjustments to the current training
and qualification frameworks for these occupations.
Sustainability: Sustainability is the ability to exist and develop without
depleting natural resources for the future.
The
United Nations defined sustainable development in the Brundtland Report as
development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the
ability of future generations to meet their own needs. It assumes that
resources are finite, and so should be used conservatively and carefully to
ensure that there is enough for future generations, without decreasing present
quality of life. A sustainable society must be socially responsible, focussing
on environmental protection and dynamic equilibrium in human and natural
systems.
Why is Sustainability Important?
There are many benefits to sustainability,
both short-term and long-term. We cannot maintain our Earth’s ecosystems or
continue to function as we do if more sustainable choices are not made. If
harmful processes are maintained with no change, it is likely that we will run
out of fossil fuels, huge numbers of animal species will become extinct, and
the atmosphere will be irreparably damaged. Clean air and nontoxic
atmospheric conditions, growth of resources that can be relied upon, and water
quality and cleanliness, are all benefits of sustainability.
What are the 3 Pillars of Sustainability?
The concept of sustainability is composed of
three pillars: environmental, social and economic—also known informally as
profits, planet, and people. These are in particular relevant to corporate
sustainability, and efforts made by companies.
1.
Environmental
protection is the most frequently discussed
element. It is concerned with the reduction of carbon footprints, water usage,
non-decomposable packaging, and wasteful processes as part of a supply chain.
These processes can often be cost-effective, and financially useful as well as
important for environmental sustainability.
2.
Social development is about treating employees fairly and ensuring
responsible, ethical, and sustainable treatment of employees, stakeholders, and
the community in which a business operates. This may be achieved through more
responsive benefits, like better maternity and paternity benefits, flexible
scheduling, and learning and development opportunities. For example, business
should operate using sustainable labour, which involves fairly-paid, adult
employees who can operate in a safe environment.
3.
Economic development is probably the simplest form of sustainability. To be
economically sustainable, a business must be profitable and produce enough
revenues to be continued into the future. The challenge with this form of
sustainability is achieving an equilibrium. Rather than making money at any
cost, companies should attempt to generate profit in accordance with other
elements of sustainability.
Focussing on social and environmental
sustainability in addition to economic performance is an approach frequently
referred to as the Triple Bottom Line.
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