Y.F.F. works on new youth policy

This week, officials of Youth for the Future will take delivery of a public address system, courtesy of UNICEF. According to Y.F.F. administrator Linsford Castillo, the donation will be used in connection with meetings and consultations to create a new national policy for Belize’s young people. Castillo says the idea is to update a policy drafted in 1995 in an attempt to make it more user friendly.

Linsford Castillo, Y.F.F. Administrator
?Coupled with that we also are ensuring that the policy calls for key areas, key practical areas such as a national youth council where young people are literally involved in the development process and also an integral part of the leadership, in terms of what the plan, as we have it already, calls for. So with those things in mind, we are certain that this policy will not become just another policy drafted and just become useless and of no impact.?

Janelle Chanona, Reporting
?How much of an impact do you think this can have on the widespread youth population in Belize being that is such a significant percentage of our population??

Linsford Castillo
?Well certainly the policy is one that speaks for the country of Belize. This is what Belize is saying as far as it stands on young people. This is what the government is saying as far as what they have in mind when it comes to young people. So this instrument should be very significant, it is a long term policy certainly that calls for youth development and also most importantly youth in development, which is very significant. And so we see this as most important and certainly moving away from just that an ad hoc approach and guesstimating type of process that we are so used to become involve in that we now should have a policy in place that calls for specific issues as it relates to young people. And this policy I must say is in the best interest of young people, so it should work as far as we are concerned.?

According to Castillo, the national policy is expected to be completed in June. UNICEF and Y.F.F. entered into a partnership agreement in mid-2005.