Global Changemakers

Travelling for 3 days on buses, trains, planes and minibus taxis, 10 Scots headed to Cape Town, South Africa, to participate in an extraordinary and unprecedented exchange conceived, organised, and run by and for young people. Along with ten South African participants from across the city; Khayelitsha, Mannenberg and Guguletu, they gather to learn from each other, to teach new skills and create shared experiences to enable them to act as leaders within their own communities – fighting to end poverty.

“Their capacities are extraordinary, their intelligence unlimited and their moral consciences entirely compelling… I urge you to join me in investing in their efforts. You will be, I think, as amazed as I was and indeed as grateful as I am for their existence. “YEP Patron and Academy Award Winning Actress, Emma Thompson.

When Nick and I met in Scotland in late 2008 it was our firm belief that young people can be effective agents for change in their own communities. Our vision is to provide a platform for young people (ages 16- 25) to develop their skills and become anti poverty ambassadors/ activist and raise awareness of poverty and social justice issues

We wanted Youth End Poverty to work with young people from South Africa and Scotland, and it is based on the themes of diversity and inclusion, equality and social justice, community development, democracy and active participation, social action and human rights and social responsibility. Above all we believe that young people can be effective agents for social change if they participate in projects that are youth led, values based, action oriented and future focused.

We wanted to connect young people from the two countries in a bold attempt to get them involved in local action that will make global waves. We decided to host a two way international exchange and thanks to our patron Emma Thompson we were able to host 10 young Scots in Cape Town from the 3 to the 17 July 2009. The visit realised that we as young activist do not live in a vacuum and we need to connect globally around specific issues.

What do we hoped to achieve with this visit?

• Facilitate the development of more effective youth activists
• Embed grassroots links between Scotland and South Africa
• Explore community action from multiple perspectives
• Leave a positive impact with the people and organizations involved
• Bring new ideas, skills and knowledge back to Scotland for the benefit of Government, the voluntary sector and our activists’ own work
• Participants act as young ambassadors of a modern and vibrant South Africa and Scotland.

Starting an exchange of this nature is always a tricky endeavour and being a group of young people attempting to get a group of our peers together and leading an exchange looking at poverty and how it manifests itself in one country is especially difficult. But we were confident then as we are today that as young people with a vision we are unstoppable.

We decided that we will structure the learning for the two weeks as follows:

Education and employment:

This allowed both the SA and Scottish participants to analyze the South African Education system and how it prepares students for the world of work, Compare and contrast South African and Scottish education systems. This was an interesting exercise as all of the South African participants were unemployed which some participants felt was an indication that the education systems have failed them. The Scottish participants also had the opportunity to share their experiences of education in their country. The group looked at the role education played in the anti- apartheid struggle and how young people mobilised themselves politically.

Poverty and the Economy

This was the core issue during this exchange. We wanted young people to get an understanding of poverty and development in South Africa through the content on the exchange, the organisations we visit and through the home visits. We also compared and contrasted the economic and poverty eradication policies and practices in Scotland and South Africa. One of the key the mechanisms for individuals to lift themselves out of poverty is personal development and the group conceded through social action projects we can do this.

It was important to look at the role of young people in the economy in South Africa as they are the majority of the population and form the biggest part of the “informal” economy.
We visited Nolokhulo a community development organisation in Khayelitsha to explore how communities can reduce poverty through economic development and how they can make the economy work in their favour. The Scottish participants commented on how South African communities had very little resources but were innovative, creative and motivated to enact change in their communities.

The outcome of this section is that poverty is visible in both South Africa and in Scotland but the scope and intensity is very different.

Environmental Awareness and Climate Change

We were not as successful in our aim to explore the groups understanding of climate change and how it relates to poverty. A visit to the Cape flats Nature Reserve at the University of the Western Cape allowed us to link the importance of the environment to overall sustainability and also to link growing food gardens at schools to nutrition. The group got insight into how indigenous plants are used on the Cape Flats where abject poverty is worsened by dry conditions. The visit to the nature reserve gave us an opportunity to highlight problems and solutions and analyze the possible impacts of these problems and solutions that Climate Change presents.

Community and Arts development

This formed the most visible outcomes of the exchange. The Creative arts are an important tool we can use to not only empower but also as a key facilitator for discussion. By working with a well renowned creative arts facilitator, Ms Greer Valley we were able to train young people to be more effective arts facilitators and transfer practical art skills. The idea was that we were going to create a mural in one of the most poverty stricken communities in Cape Town, Hanover Park. This allowed us to analyse the role that arts plays in community development. Our Mural titled the MURAL OF DREAMS gave us an opportunity to work with Community Action Towards a Safer Environment (CASE) and Peacejam. The aim of the mural of dreams was for the YEP participants to work with PEACEJAM and CASE to create a mural that would act as a visual space for young people to make their dreams visible and to have a point of reference that can direct them in achieving their dreams. This gave us an opportunity to involve young people in hands on arts projects. There were mixed feelings about the impact of creating a mural and how that can help us reach our goal to end poverty. During the planning stages of the mural the participants “did not understand how art can make a difference?” One of the questions was how can painting make a difference? Some of the immediate responses from the group were that “painting lifted people’s spirits”. The mural team were weary of entering the community of Hanover Park as it had a reputation of being violent and crime ridden but as one of the participants commented “instead of being robbed we were helped”.

This allowed us to explore how the arts can be used in peace building and citizenship development, specifically in post apartheid reconciliation. One of the sticky points during the two week visit was the issue of the self”. During a session on identity where participants were asked the question: Who are you? The Scottish participants commented that they felt uncomfortable talking about themselves and their abilities. They felt more comfortable doing things than talking. The South African participants felt more comfortable talking about themselves. One of the reasons this may be is because the South African participants met months before the exchange and the Scots did not. The Scottish participants had to form a group identity and this allowed the exchange to move away from the core issues and turn it into a people centred visit. There was a time when personalities dominated. Intercultural conversations are difficult and this visit allowed us to use the creative arts as a tool to have some very difficult conversations.

The issue of Xenophobia and community integration allowed us to explore how different tools were used in conflict resolution and community integration with reference to Xenophobia. Through working with the Adonis Musati Refugee Group we had the opportunity to talk about refugees and immigration and the impact this has on poverty. Poverty has become the new enemy; many people flee their countries in search of better living conditions and are treated ghastly by governments and peoples of the countries they seek refuge from. A problem that the group agrees is both visible in South Africa and Scotland. In South Africa this problem was given a visual face when violence erupted in communities around South Africa. One of the most gruesome images being a Mozambican man being burnt to death, the interaction with the Adonis Musati Refugee group allowed us to talk openly about “our fear of foreigners” but also to explore how migrants from poor countries with skills are given access to countries such as Scotland but those destitute are denied entry, jailed and deported

One of the highlights of this section was a visit to a project called Black Moses, a project run by one of the YEP Cape Town participants. The visit allowed the group to be inspired by the creativity of these young performers and how they make use of their cultural heritage to learn valuable creative arts skills, entertain their communities and also act as positive role models for young people with no or very little hope.

Leadership and Capacity Building

In line with our aim to create more effective youth facilitators we wanted to build the leadership capacity of the participants and the facilitators. One of the key tools to enable this to be successful was to conduct individual and group leadership skills audits. Unfortunately this audit was never completed but we have committed ourselves to making this part of continuous work. Each day we had a SA and SCOT leading the facilitation of the day to allow training and skill sharing. We initially wanted to place each young person with an organisation for two days to learn more about its work and to help identify personal development priorities but due to a lack of funds this was not possible. Through personal interactions with participants we had an opportunity to asses the skill level.

The exchange was a huge success and we left a positive mark on the communities we were so fortunate to work with. This was the first of the two way exchange visit and we have now embarked on a fundraising activity to raise funds for the South Africans to visit Scotland in 2010. This visit will follow up on the Social Action Projects participants have worked on as well as look at the impact of poverty on a developed country like Scotland. With this update also comes a call to action. A call to all out there, young and old to start investing in the future and end poverty lets start by investing in young people. Youth End Poverty is a small project and we all have small CAPs but with small CAPs come big results. Join us in our efforts to connect young people from all over the world. Join us in ending poverty.