Directors-General, UNESCO
The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) and the Federal Capital Territory Administration (FCTA) on July 17, 2017 launched the Youth Mobile Initiative in Abuja to empower 400 youth to develop mobile applications.
The project, launched at the FCDA Conference Hall, Garki, Abuja is in furtherance of UNESCO’s commitment towards engaging the youth in meaningful ventures, especially in Information Technology (IT) development.
The project is expected to run for about 10 months and will focus on young women to build skills and confidence to develop, promote, and sell locally relevant mobile applications that solve local issues of sustainable development, and provide self-generated, viable employment opportunities in the mobile/ICT industry.
The UNESCO YouthMobile Initiative was created in 2014 and offers introductory courses in computer programming (learning-to-code) and problem solving (coding-to-learn). The initiative seeks to support links between the worlds of skill education, entrepreneurship and marketing, so that beneficiaries of training initiatives, particularly unemployed youth, get more opportunities to effectively use their skills to give shape to their ideas as viable real‐life business activities.
The Initiative contributes towards the building of inclusive knowledge societies by enhancing Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) skills and open solutions to empower youth to resolve identified local issues of sustainable development, especially those related to poverty reduction, climate change and disproportionate youth unemployment through the use of smart mobile applications.
