Austin Maliwa

Malawi has over 220 youth organisations that are affiliated to the National Youth Council of Malawi (NYCOM). Among these are Youth-Led Organizations (YLOs) who face unique barriers with regards to technical capacity and funding opportunities.

Despite this, YLOs are some of the most innovative, passionate, energetic and impactful entities in both Social justice movements and alternative livelihoods programming around the country and they are overcoming the aforementioned barriers.

Research indicates that youth-led organisations face a variety of issues when fundraising, which range from lack of sufficient staff or volunteer capacity, limited knowledge about the donor landscape and working in contexts or on topics where funding is limited.

To change this narrative, Youth Wave, a youth led NGO, produced a report “What Youth Want” where key recommendations were given to partners on empowering youth-led organisations to land more equitable partnerships and ultimately, greater results for partners in achieving the change they wish to see in the world

Change starts with you(th) and this why Youth Wave in collaboration with Trōcaire Malawi intends brought youth and development partners together under Space4Youth with an aim of building interest in partnerships between the donor community and youth led organisations by capitalizing on their skills, expertise and collective power of youth.

The event brought different stakeholders together including government, development partners, the private sector and youth-led organisations from across the country.