6 th TUNZA SAYEN Regional Meet 2009
16-19 November 2009, Colombo , Sri Lanka

The 6 th TUNZA SAYEN Regional Meet was successfully concluded at Colombo , Sri Lanka on 19 th November 2009 . The 4-day meet was organised and hosted by Centre for Environment Education Sri Lanka (CEE SL) and was jointly conducted by UNEP Regional Office of Asia and the Pacific (ROAP) and the SAYEN Secretariat, Centre for Environment Education (CEE) India. Ministry of Environment and Natural Resource (MENR), Government of Sri Lanka provided all necessary support for the meet and also hosted the Welcome Dinner for all the participants.

The meet was truly a youth meet as 21 youth (age group 15-24 years), 10 from Bangaldesh , India , Maldives , Nepal , Pakistan and 11 from Sri Lanka participated at the meet. The meet was facilitated by the youth participants, specifically the two TUNZA National Youth Advisors, Mr. Muhammad Zeeshaan Shahid from Pakistan and Mr. Belal Hossain from Bangladesh . Ms. Satwant Kaur, Regional Information Office, UNEP ROAP and Mr. Gopal Kumar Jain, Coordinator, SAYEN Secretarait; also participated at the meet.

A google group SAYEN2009Meet, was set up for participants prior to the meeting. The group has been active in discussing the agenda and other details of the Regional Meet. The group will continue its discussions, particularly on projects, climate change youth national coalition group, task forces developed at the meet and other relevant outcomes of the meet.

Some key activities at the meet included:

  1. SAYEN WorkPlan 2009-14 : The SAYEN workplan developed with inputs from youth in SAYEN member countries was refined during the meeting. The workplan will be finalized and shared with participants, SAYEN network members and UNEP.
  2. Orientation of participants to Climate Change : Interactive sessions with experts from Sri Lanka and a participant were conducted to help participant understand basics of Climate Change, the global debate and globally ongoing activities on Youth and Climate Change.
  3. Interaction on Using Media Effectively : Interactions were conducted with two media representatives from The Nations and the Sunday Times, two key national newspapers from Sri Lanka, on how young people could effectively use media to reach out to others, specifically on the theme, Climate Change.
  4. Learnings from the field : The participants were taken to three sites, focussing two different eco-system—marine and forest. The first site was a Turtle Conservation Programme during which collected turtle eggs, when hatched, the baby turtles were released into the sea; the second site was travel on glass boats to observe the coral bleeching, an impact of climate change and third was a nature trail in a rain forest. All the three sites were a great learning expereince for the participants.
  5. Project Sheets: Each participant was selected based on projects that they are undertaking or planning to undertake. During the meeting, participants shared with the group their projects followed by sometime animated discussions. A template was developed which will be filled by each participants and provided to SAYEN Secretariat and UNEP ROAP, to be shared with global youth team and UNEP Head Quarters.
  6. Online Resource on Climate Change : SAYEN Secretariat will be putting together an online resource on climate change for youth, particularly to help gain knowledge regarding climate change and help them faccilitate their project/ activities on Climate Change. Few broad content of the resource material was discussed with the participants. It was decided that the material should be available both as a pdf document as well as web pages. Detail outline and writing of the material will be conducted through SAYEN Google Group.
  7. Open Letter to South Asian Governments –It was decided that since there is already a youth statement from the South Asia Climate Youth Network meeting in Nepal and the Tunza Youth Conference in Korea , participants should develop an open letter to be sent South Asian Governments. A first draft was developed during the meeting. It was decided that the letter would be shared with the members of the SAYEN Google group. The final letter would be sent to media and Government Representatives in South Asian Countries.
  8. Formation of Coalition of youth working on Climate: South Asia Youth Climate Change Network - so that different youth groups working on different areas (or similar) of the environment can share and exchange ideas, benefit from each others' experience, and thereby strengthen and help each other in reaching their goals – essentially the care and protection of environment.
  9. Skype meetings: To start, 2 nd Sunday for 4 months. Facilitators have been identified for each month
  10. Task Force: 2 Task forces – on resource mobilization and dealing with the media were established and participants identified to work on each of these areas. The task force will share their discussions and findings with the SAYEN Google Group
  11. 1 minute video messages on YouTube – each of the participants will provide a 1-minute message on an area of the environment. These will be edited and posted on YouTube.