Introductory remarks by Commissioner Urpilainen at the 5th General Assembly of the Sahel Alliance – panel II “Youth empowerment through education and skills development”

Speech by Urpilainen at the Sahel Alliance General Assembly

Dear colleagues and partners,

Warm congratulations to German colleagues for an exemplary organisation of the European Football Championship which just ended.

I would have liked to be with you in Berlin today, but due to my scheduled permanence this week in Strasbourg, I am with you only virtually. Am particularly glad to address this panel dedicated to youth empowerment through education and skills.

I have three messages for you today.

First, I want to thank the Sahel Alliance and Minister Schulze for convening us all here together: we have been having less and less occasions to talk jointly about the Sahel. I regret the low Ministerial attendance from the Sahel countries, except for Mauritania. As stated consistently over the last months, the EU is keen and open to dialogue and remains engaged.

The Sahel remains a region very important to the European Union, with which we are connected under many angles and share many interests.

As you know, our engagement is tailored to the different political context – the EU enjoys a solid partnership with Mauritania, promotes an inclusive transition in Chad and is committed to rediscuss ways to remain engaged with the three countries of the central Sahel.

At a moment when humanitarian needs are unprecedented, I believe it is crucial to maintain a level of engagement of development actors in the region. The EU does so by pursuing a Territorial Integrated Approach along the humanitarian-development-peace nexus.

Second, as European Commissioner for international partnerships, I have been putting young people and education at the heart of the EU external actions. In the past five years I have been increasing the share of education under the budget under my responsibility from 7% to 13% and launched the first-ever Youth Action Plan.

This is incredibly relevant for the Sahel, where young people represent by far the biggest share of the population.

I am glad to announce the launch of the European Flagship Initiative for Youth in the Sahel. This will be our compass for empowering young people, as individuals via scholarships and tailored trainings, as groups, further establishing or strengthening Youth Sounding Boards and boosting youth-led organisations, and finally creating an enabling environment.

Third, I would like to welcome the Flagship on Education launched by Germany and implemented by the World Bank aiming at strengthening education systems in the Sahel and expanding access to quality education. This is very complementary to our Flagship Initiative for Youth. We will ensure that Education and Youth remain at the core of our joint actions in the Sahel.

The EU is keen to co-create such actions with the Sahel countries and their young people – adapting interventions to rural and fragile areas, and to ensure coordination within Team Europe.

To conclude, to dedicate funds to education and youth empowerment is the investment with the biggest return. This is evident for Africa and especially for the Sahel – where there is a huge opportunity to capitalise on a demographic dividend.

The EU has been leading by example and is keen to keep playing its role. I would therefore like to call upon countries in the Sahel and partners alike to work together along the same goal – empowering their young people by reinforcing the education systems, creating livelihood opportunities and together making the SDG4 a reality.