Strengthening inclusion of young people’s voices in violence prevention and programming

About the project

The Government of Jamaica, in its 2030 National Development Plan, acknowledges that ‘violent crimes have become one of the most pressing concerns for Jamaicans’ and that such crimes have a negative impact on all spheres of society. In 2017, the murder rate in Jamaica had increased to 57 per 100,000, the second-highest recorded rate in the world. Young males are the group most affected by violent crime and youth are the largest sub-group (15-24 years) ‘involved as both the primary victims and perpetrators of violent crimes and murder in particular’.

The Government of Jamaica, in its National Development Strategy 2020, underlines that the statistics ‘suggest the need for a community-based approach in the analysis of response to these crimes’. Furthermore, the 2014 National Security Policy acknowledges that to make Jamaica more safe and secure, there is a need to foster greater levels of involvement and stronger partnerships among citizens, civil society and all government ministries, departments and agencies involved in safety and security services.

The proposed project will seek to support young people to influence the design, development and delivery of violence prevention programming in two of Kingston’s worst-affected neighbourhoods, Denham Town and Parade Gardens, and will ensure that their perspectives inform the National Commission on Violence Prevention.

This will be achieved by:

• Supporting and training youth and civil society organisation (CSO) leaders to monitor government action on security policies and programmes, and provide updates to community members;
• Training youth groups and CSOs in human rights, advocacy, child protection, community development, governance, advocacy and communication;
• Creating community forums and opportunities where relevant community perspectives on national security policies can be discussed. This will include a summary of community perspectives that will be created and tabled at the National Commission on Violence Prevention;
• Supporting youth groups and CSOs to develop and implement both traditional and social media campaigns which will include the sharing of stories on the impact of security policies.

Through this project, 1,000 youth and CSO leaders will be trained in communications, human rights, child protection, governance and community development. Youth and CSO leaders will be better prepared and equipped with the relevant skills to voice their concerns, priorities, and participate in policy design, development and public discourse on youth violence prevention. In addition to capacity building, the project will also help raise awareness among youth, civil society and communities of the impact of policies and programmes, and enable them to share their perspectives on how they are impacted by these programmes.

To help contribute towards the sustainability of project interventions, FFP is hopeful that its evidence-based recommendations could be incorporated into state budgets, policies, legislation and long-term programming.