We hear very often in United Nations context that Youth have great potentials, that Youth civic engagement is the key to sustainable development and climate protection, that Youth shall be lead change agents etc.

But there are no information management tools existing within United Nations System that would map, document and value what young people are actually doing all around the world for addressing global challenges in support of United Nations system.

Lack of Global Action Networking information infrastructure means lack of global networking support and lack of (standardized) societal recognition of global youth action. From this follows lack of funding (public and philanthropic) and those young people who are willing to engage with their creativity and action in United Nations programs and goals sooner or later can’t afford any longer to pursue action in support of United Nations system.

A solution to the problem: Global Challenges (GloCha) Youth Actionpedia

GloCha (standing for Global Challenges) is a Global Action Network based on the conviction and ethics that every Global Citizen can and shall contribute to sustainable development and climate action on local and global level and thus to goals of United Nations system.

GloCha is a brain child of International Association for the Advancement of Innovative Approaches to Global Challenges http://www.glocha.info, an UN ECOSOC and UN DPI accredited Civil Society Organization based in Klagenfurt am Wörthersee (Austria) which is also member of UN Academic Impact initiative.

GloCha has a special focus on youth engagement in UN goals and programs and it has been developed in the run-up to Rio+20 UN Conference on Sustainable Development by a team of about 10 innovation experts in the context of Rio+20 Issues Cluster on Innovation and a team of about 50 global youth leaders in the context of Rio+20 Global Youth Music Contest.

In June 2012 IAAI announced global civil society voluntary commitment at Rio+20 UN Conference on Sustainable Development – the so called ‘15/15/15 Rio+20 UN Civil Society Resource Mobilization Partnership Voluntary Commitment’ http://sustainabledevelopment.un.org/index.php?page=view&type=1006&menu=1348&nr=88 - which states that “Global civil society on the one hand commits at Rio+20 to mobilize 15 billion Euros and 15 million volunteers by the year 2015 for UN led sustainable development efforts and on the other hand requests new forms of participation in global SD governance.”

For implementation of this global youth focused approach of having 15 million global citizens (and in later phases also local communities and cities) engaged, the concept of “Global Challenges Giving Pledges” has been presented by IAAI and partners at a Side Event of 6th Session of UN Open Working Group on Sustainable Development Goals http://www.glocha.info/index.php/latest-news/240-iaai-glocha-event-owg6 (idea: Inviting young people - with reference to emerging global SDGs framework - to communicate in the context of IAAI initiative Global Youth Music Contest (= follow-up to Rio+20 Global Youth Music Contest) what they are doing for sustainable development in local and global context and inviting them to develop goals for individual sustainable lifestyle and SDGs civic engagement.

Global Challenges Youth Actionpedia as the necessary information and communication technology infrastructure shall be developed at a “Global Hub on Youth, ICT and Innovation for Sustainable Development (YouthICT4SD Hub)” based in Klagenfurt/Austria with a corresponding network of Global Challenges Youth ICT Centers as local level multistakeholder partnership .