Green Africa Youth Organization (GAYO)

About

GAYO is a youth-led gender-balanced Non-Governmental Organization (NGO), actively delivering advocacy and solution-oriented projects for environmental sustainability and community development. GAYO’s Mission is to reach out and provide solutions to pressing environmental through youth empowerment skills development and public education GAYO’s Vision is to create a world whereby conserving the natural environment will be the number one priority of the masses.

Founding year: 2014

Countries: Botswana, Ghana, Kenya, Uganda

Themes: Climate Change; Circular Economy; Disaster Risk Reduction; Inclusion; Green Economy; Skill and Education
 

 

Key Highlights

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Zero Waste Cities: The Zero Waste project’s focus is on delivering community -driven Zero Waste strategy in cities to drive waste from oceans and mangrove ecosystems to a material recovery facility for processing and to establish a Private –Public Partnership model to be replicated across Africa. The project also seeks to create a new green and blue circular economy for vulnerable people in the municipality by training existing SMEs to use municipal waste as raw materials to create useful products. Additionally, restoring dignity for migrants and informal waste pickers, creating jobs, and achieving climate and environmental justice.

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Africa Climate Innovations Challenge (ACIC)The ACIC is an idea contest that challenges young Africans to develop solutions to combat climate change in their local communities. Over the past two years, the initiative has supported 8 teams made up of young African innovators with personalized capacity building efforts and over US$40,000 in funding to implement their innovative project ideas, scale solutions, and drive the green economy while reducing unemployment and eradicating poverty. Two of the winners of the ACIC include a young woman in Madagascar who is growing seaweed to help combat food insecurity and another team in Ghana that is developing geopolymer precast components for construction.

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The Youth Climate Council (YCC) is an institutional mechanism for the youth climate movement in the Global South, providing an avenue for every youth-led organization, individual, and the general public to bring their opinions into national climate-related decision-making processes. Its movement assists nationwide consultation in bringing diverse youth perspectives into policy formulation while also enhancing movement solidarity for shared resources and expertise. It has a database of over 5000 youth operated in Brazil, Costa Rica, Nigeria and Uganda, The movement is engaged in knowledge and professional development opportunities, capacity-building training, dialogues and consultations, advocacy and campaigns.