Joyce is from Ghana. She is representing the Guttmacher Institute's Protecting the Next Generation Project at the conference.

I was in the skill building session this morning. It focused on "Unemployment, Poverty and Strategies to Empower Youth toward Economic Independence." There was a presentation on the situation of the youth on Saba Island in the Caribbean and structures put in place to promote economic independence.

Clearly from the presentations and results from group work, most countries shared similar youth economic independence barriers. My own country of Ghana is challenged with lack of education and skill, perception and attitudes of both the youth and decision makers, lack of support from the family system and poverty among others.

In the session, some of us were given balls and asked to throw it to the next person. About five of us were in a ring and were given eight balls to pass on to the next person by throwing. This juggling exercise taught us that it was difficult to deal with all those barriers at the same time and that we have to devise a strategy to deal with them individually.

In Ghana, many young people both in and out of school complain of unemployment and poverty. In many cases their situation is simply because they haven't tried entrepreneurship, waiting all their life to be employed by others. It's so unfortunate to know that many of these unemployed young people have bright ideas and talents that have not yet been realized and that could fetch millions. No wonder it is said that the richest place on earth is the cemetery. I was thus so happy to hear the presenter from Saba mention the fact there were some entrepreneurship programmes for their youth.I was also disappointed when I first heard that some commercial sex workers are involved but have to resort to prostitution to supplement their income. Now, this prompts me to compare this to a personal experience. Once in supermarket I discovered one kind of product: breadcrumbs which had different prices simply because one had a nice and flashy package and the other was tied in very simple polythene. All I mean is that some young people have started something but have to move an extra mile to make their products unique.

One important thing I wish we don't loose sight of is the fact that our economic empowerment programmes should be more practical and realistic so as to yield results. During the conference some success stories about youth achievements were shared which shows that a lot are being done.

The Youth Action Movement and the HUD group, both in Ghana, have a lot of success stories to tell. The Youth Action Movement empowers young people to act for themselves and the HUD program focuses on young people and entrepreneurship. Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. I believe there is one good thing that we can learn from them and that is the youth power conference where young people get to meet other young achievers. This helps the young people to understand the fact that one can start from the very bottom and end up big with determination. I believe in the youth power that changes situations. As youth, let's deny the cemetery of its riches.