Following an unprecedented year, the RCE SDG Youth Challenge has now commenced its fourth year running. The global initiative aims to engage and empower local youth leaders with the opportunity to have a voice and implement their own place-based projects on issues that matter to them and the RCEs.  

Led by RCE Greater Western Sydney (hosted by Western Sydney University), this year’s theme is ‘Youth for the Goals - Resilient Planet and Communities’. It will focus on action towards SDG 11 (Sustainable Cities and Communities), SDG 12 (Responsible Consumption and Production) and SDG 15 (Life on Land), underpinned by SDGs 4 and 17. This theme is an extension of the 2020 SDG Youth Challenge, giving those impacted by the pandemic a second chance at their project and for new projects to join the collective efforts. 

Participants in this year’s Challenge include representatives from the global RCE network: 

• RCE Central Semenanjung, Malaysia: Sustainable Lifestyle for a Sustainable Campus: Synergizing Youth-Leadership through Campus Living Labs Initiatives 
• RCE Greater Western Sydney, Australia: Mycellium - Making plastics from mushrooms 
• RCE Salisbury, USA: Socio-Cultural Perspectives on Conflict and Peace: with an emphasis on Gender Training 
• RCE Yogyakarta, Indonesia: Evidence-based and Inclusive Conservation of Critically Endangered Siamese Crocodile in Indonesia 
• RCE Yogyakarta, Indonesia: Sedekah Sayursleman.id - Vegetable donation for COVID-affected communities 
• RCE Yogyakarta, Indonesia: TANDURIN - Fertilizer Making Training for Women Farmers 
• RCE Yogyakarta, Indonesia: The Crayons Project 

A number of external educational institutions and organisations are also participating. These include: 

• Conservator Ecoclean Enterprises, Kenya: Mangroves in Climate Change Mitigation and Adaptation for Environmental Sustainability 
• Teach For Green, India: Green School, Green Community 
• University of Malaya (Department of Physiology, Faculty of Medicine), Malaysia: The Green Vision of 5R 

Each project is shaped by its youth leader and/or youth team to address the needs of their communities in line with the Challenge theme. To date, the Challenge has addressed 8 of the 17 SDGs through 49 youth-led sustainability projects led by 138 youth leaders. These projects have engaged more than 20,000 youth directly using a peer-to-peer model, and almost five times this amount virtually through various social media and digital platforms. Read the 2020 report here. 

RCE Greater Western Sydney is always happy to accept late project submissions for those who still wish to join! Find out more about the Challenge guidelines and how to participate here. 

(Photo credit: RCE Greater Western Sydney)