Andrew Flanagan from Belleek expresses his and his teams opinions on global trends.
HEALTH, equality, poverty, peace.
Those were the four key themes 120 young people brought forward at the end of their meeting at the Lough Erne Resort last week, the G8 Youth summit, organised by the Fermanagh Trust, Co-operation Ireland, Future Search Network, and Libraries NI.
“The G8 Youth Summit was truly inspirational and overall a fantastic success,” said Lauri McCusker, director of the Fermanagh Trust.
“The youth summit participants have sent a very clear message to the G8 leaders when they arrive at the world leaders summit at Lough Erne Resort next month.”
The two-day event, held on Wednesday and Thursday of last week at the same venue for the Lough Erne summit.
There were two speakers on Wednesday: Caroline Casey, the Dublin-based founder of ‘Kanchi’, a ‘not-for-profit disability organisation that works to change mindsets and behaviours around disability,’ and Kanak Dixit, a journalist/writer from Nepal.
“The summit participants voices were heard on a range of issues, when they presented their priorities to political leaders and a range of other dignitaries.”
He added: “The engagement from the young people was superb. The level of insight and knowledge which the participants brought to the summit was significant. Over the two days the summit participants worked very hard to develop their key priorities and communicate these.”
The young people’s message will be recorded through video in the language of the eight leaders, and submitted to them ahead of the G8 summit, while a communique was presented to special attendees.
Speaking when the communique was presented, Theresa Villiers, Secretary of State said: “Congratulations on all your work and presentation of the Youth Summit communique. You have identified 4 very important issues in terms of Health, Equality, Poverty and Peace. Prime Minister Cameron asked me to come today and hear you presentation.
“I am delighted that I have done so and I will bring back your key messages to the Prime Minister who is responsible for the G8 Summit Agenda.”
Similarly, Greg Burton, of the US Counsulate, said: “Your presentation and the themes you have identified are all very important and I look forward to receiving the film summarising the summit findings. I will forward this on to Washington for consideration. Congratulations on all your work over the past two days.”
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