Education

The Walter and Gretel Hellendall Family Foundation presents

The World Afairs Council's G20 Summit

 On March 9, 2012, the World Affairs Council held its second annual G20 Summit, assembling students from across the greater Philadelphia region, Pittsburgh and Slovenia to debate  two key issues shaping the global economy: global youth unemployment and food security.

Watch the webcast of the open plenary session of the World Affairs Council’s G20 Summit featuring Ms. Supriya Banavalikar of the Hunger Project and Dr. Peter Cappelli, of the Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania.

 

Global Youth Unemployment

"Unemployment is an international time bomb for both developed and developing worlds."
— Former UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown

Impacting both advanced and emerging economies alike, global youth unemployment is harming both those affected and society at large. Sustained long-term unemployment across a sizeable swath of the world’s population poses a risk to even the healthiest of societies. The numbers are grim: in 2007, youth unemployment in advanced economies was 4.2%; by early 2011, this number had grown to 19.7%. At stake is a generation of young people whose creative energy and talent will go untapped—consigning a generation to a cycle of poverty, detachment from the workforce and alienation from their communities. And the damaging consequences will reverberate around the globe for decades.

Student delegates will examine policies specifically aimed at youth investment as well as long-term global strategies for growth and jobs.

Food Security

"Food and nutritional security are the foundations of a decent life, a sound education and the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals."
— Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon

The World Food Organization estimates that 1 billion people around the globe are hungry or undernourished. The prospect of feeding the Earth’s inhabitants, estimated to reach 9 billion by 2030, remains one of the more fundamental, long-term challenges facing the global community. The consequences of failure will trigger a threatening convergence of humanitarian, environmental, political and regional security concerns. Consequently, agricultural policies and food security now sit at the top of the G20’s agenda.

Food security is not a simple matter of the world not being able to grow a sufficient quantity of food to feed a rising global population. Rather, it is the result of a complex web of local, regional and international politics and agricultural policies that intersect global trends relating to climate stability, energy, technology, governance and poverty. Student delegates will analyze policies implicating all of these issues and examine more closely the direct drivers of food insecurity, including market regulations, price stability, land access and risk management, including established safety nets.

Download the G20 informational flier.