Youth Information Centres to be Opened in Three Parishes

Parliamentary Secretary in the Ministry of Information, Culture, Youth and Sports, Senator Warren Newby, has informed that the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) has committed $15 million to develop Youth Information Centres (YIC) in St. Thomas, St. Elizabeth, and St. Ann.
“The centre in St. Ann should be opened during the course of this financial year, and work will begin on the centres in St. Elizabeth and St. Thomas to ensure their opening during the first quarter of the next financial year. These centres will be located in existing buildings owned by the Government, which will be fully refurbished and retrofitted to meet the needs of the youth,” Senator Newby disclosed during his contribution to the State of the Nation Debate in the Upper House on July 18.
Centres have already been established in St. Mary, Kingston, Portland, and Portmore in St. Catherine, and work is currently near completion on a centre in St. James.
Senator Newby said that the government is committed to expanding the reach of these centres through increasing the number of centres across the island and that plans are already in place to ensure that a YIC will be operational in all parishes within the next three years.
“These centres are youth-friendly spaces that allow youth to be comfortable discussing and accessing information on issues concerning them – from sex to HIV/AIDS to employment to personal advancement,” he informed. He noted in addition, that the centres serve as an avenue to facilitate the empowerment of young people through the provision of information in a non-judgmental and friendly environment.
YICs are a focal point for the work among youth-focused organizations and a clearing house for information required for research, planning or implementing programmes targeting the persons in the 15 to 24 age group.
The services offered by the YIC include free access to the Internet, counselling and referral services, empowerment sessions, and information on scholarships, career development, youth organizations, entrepreneurship programmes, educational facilities, and training opportunities.
“All of the centres that are being developed will have a cyber centre with at least 14 computers, office space for three staff members, a resource area and a meeting space. We are also aiming to ensure that these centres also have outdoor sporting facilities, which will attract more unattached youths to these centres. All of these centres will be based in areas within the parishes that are transportation hubs so as to ensure that the maximum possible numbers of young people are able to access these services,” Senator Newby further informed.
Additionally, an agreement was signed with the Korean Organization for International Co-operation Agency (KOICA), on April 17, for the provision of $37.4 million to develop centres in Manchester and Westmoreland. These centres, which are due to be completed by March 2009, will be the first centres, which will be fully constructed based on a prototype youth friendly design, and will also be the largest centres to date at 280 square metres each.
The Parliamentary Secretary also informed that discussions are nearing completion with the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) in relation to the development of centres for St. Catherine, Clarendon, St. Andrew, Hanover and Trelawny.
“We are expecting to sign this agreement in the course of this financial year, with three centres to be ready in the financial year of 2009/10 and two centres in the 2010/11 fiscal year,” he stated.