Year: 2021- Ongoing
Supported by: Yuwa, Ypeer Nepal, Visible Impact, Rotaract Club of Kathmandu Mid-Town, Right Here Right Now (RHRN), Nepalese Youth for Climate Action (NYCA), Blind Youth Association Nepal (BYAN), Beyond Beijing Committee Nepal (BBC), Asia Pacific Resource and Research Center for Women (ARROW)
Major Component: young people, APFSD, SDG, HLPF
Introduction
NAYA is a platform created by young individuals and organizations that were part of the APFSD Youth Forum 2021. NAYA envisions young people at the forefront of Agenda 2030 for Sustainable Development at the national, regional, and international levels. Currently, there are eleven youth-led and serving organizations in the working group of NAYA (Yuwa, Visible Impact, NYCA, BYAN, BBC, Rotaract Club of Kathmandu-Midtown, Leo Club Nepalaya, ARROW, and RHRN2, Sambandha Nepal and Y-PEER) with a membership of more than 200 young people in all their diversities.
Visible Impact is serving as a secretariat for NAYA. We have now successfully reached the Phase V of NAYA in 2025.
Major activities under NAYA
Week Long Social media activities
Every year, international forums on important issues take place around the world that discuss on Sustainable Development Goals and other important issues like Climate Change. Two of those conferences are High Level Political Forum (HLPF) and Conference of Parties (COP).
NAYA launches social media activities on handles of Visible Impact where the information about these forums, and the recommendations from them are shared every year, around these forums. The main objective of this activity is to educate youths about these important forums and encourage them to engage in those. Our main focus is to prioritize the inclusivity component on SDGs like health, gender equality and climate action.
Around HLPF and COP, we share infographics containing information in an interesting way and post them through a series of Facebook, Instagram and X.
Social Media Contests
Social media contests of different themes are announced through the social media handles of Visible Impact, mainly around the important events happening around the world concerning SDG, youths and climate action. These contests are mainly art-based where the youths are encouraged to send different pieces of art like photographs, videos, blogs/stories/poems or even paintings and e-posters. Reward for the winner is provided.
The main objective of this activity is to try and make the participants understand the core concept of SDG and climate change and be able to reflect that understanding practically, through artistic media. In addition, it encourages youth to actively participate to learn instead of being a passive learner.
In previous phases, we also ran a reaction snap contest. Reaction snap was a unique contest where participants had to send a message to a friend related to themes like SRHR, Gender equality, or Climate Change. The reaction of friends has to be recorded and shared with the consent of the respective person.
COP and Youth Consultations
Around COP, NAYA collaborates with its member organizations who work directly in the field of climate change like NYCA and conducts a Pre-COP and a post COP event with youths. These events usually include the Nepalese youths who participate in the respective COPs. In the pre-COP event, the youths are educated about the COP process, its objectives, Nepal’s stand at COP and engagement of youths at such forums. Similarly, in a post-COP event, the participants who went to COP that year share their experiences at COP.
This activity makes the youths inspired from their stories and also educate them on the important of such forums to shape international and national policies at all levels.
Youth Conclaves
Every year, a virtual youth consultation is organized by NAYA. This is considered as a preparatory session for youths just before APFSD Youth Forum. In this consultation, a keynote speaker provides an overview on Sustainable Development Goals and the specific SDGs that are going to be reviewed in HLPF of that particular year. Afterwards, the participants are made to enter the breakout session according to their SDG of interest. A moderator then opens the floor for them where the issues/challenges of the particular SDG is discussed in the first half while the recommendations to address those challenges are also provided by the youths in the second half of the session.
The consultation ends with group presentations of all SDG sessions, and a poll for major takeaways. The challenges and recommendations are noted down by the rapporteurs in all breakout sessions. Those notes are compiled, and an outcome document is prepared which is called ‘ Nepal’s Call to Action to APFSD’. This document is presented to the stakeholders including regional and national partners, ministries and other parties, as a consolidated voices of youths to accelerate SDG progress.
High-Level Dialogue: Youth at the Forefront of SDG in Nepal
To foster ongoing engagement between policymakers and youth, a High-Level Dialogue is conducted every year. It covers important SDGs that are covered at HLPF of that respective year. SDG-promoting policies and practices are highlighted by stakeholders such as the National Planning Commission and the concerned Ministries. The conversation focuses on how these policies further Agenda 2030 and suggest additions or changes that are essential for Nepal to achieve Agenda 2030. The websites and social media accounts of NAYA-affiliated organizations share the results of the dialogue. This platform serves as a preparatory phase with the possible government delegates attending the coming APFSD.
Other Activities of Previous Phases of NAYA
Provincial Youth Consultation
NAYA also supported the provincial youth consultations organized by YUWA under RHRN II. The provincial youth consultations were conducted in all 7 provinces of Nepal, where youth in their diversities from the region were gathered for an in-depth discussion on SDG 4: Quality Education, and SDG 5: Gender Equality. The issues and recommendations based on the specific provinces were generated by the young people. The outcomes from the provincial youth consultations were further incorporated in the final document of Nepal’s Call to Action for APFSD 2022.
Youth Policy Dialogue
NAYA organized a Youth Policy Dialogue in a panel discussion format consisting of key decision-makers and a youth representative. A dialogue was conducted to discuss different policies being implemented to achieve SDGs in Nepal, exchange updates, and sensitize each other about the need to bring young people to the forefront as torchbearers of sustainable development.
Amplifying NAYA
Different activities, from networking to momentum building in collaboration with other national and/or international stakeholders, was prioritized. NAYA continued its efforts and support towards the CSE4ALL Advocacy Campaign and also encourage its working group members and members to be part of this campaign and amplify our voices through social media platforms. NAYA has been collaborating with the SDGs National Network Nepal in strengthening the SDGs movement and ensuring youth engagement in achieving the Agenda 2030 on SDGs in Nepal.
NAYA V (2025)
NAYA V continued its efforts to conduct different activities like previous years, that prepared youths to review and participate in the national, regional and international fora of SDG at all levels. Along with that, NAYA did some new initiatives this year.
Co-organizing National Youth Consultation on LLDC3
On 28th July, a National Youth Consultation was organized to prepare for the Third UN Conference on Landlocked Developing Countries (LLDC), highlighting issues and recommendations on five different thematic areas, unique to Nepal, being one of the 32 LLDCs at UN House. Thirty-six youths from diverse backgrounds had an in-depth discussion, identified problems under different thematic areas, and provided a youth-driven recommendations.
The recommendations documented in the session will serve as a key input to Nepal’s engagement in the LLDC3 process.
Preparation of Goal Profiles
A voluntary call was made among the NAYA working group members to involve in a goal profile creating activity, aimed for Sub-regional preparatory forum happening in Pakistan between 3-5 November, and Nepal Youth Forum. Goal profiles of all five goals to be reviewed in HLPF 2026 were prepared following intense desk reviews and series of meetings with the working group members.
In the previous years, a ‘Call to Action’ document used to be made from youth consultations while this year, we conducted both desk reviews and a youth consultation to prepare a detailed and well-researched goal profiles of each Goals to be discussed in APFSD 2026.
Nepal Youth Forum 2025
Nepal Youth Forum was organized by Nepal APFSD Youth Alliance (NAYA) in collaboration with NIDWAN and SDG National Network. It took place virtually via Zoom, on 17th October. 53 participants from diverse backgrounds attended the forum and provided their input on issues and recommendations regarding SDG 6 (Clean water and sanitation), 7 (clean and affordable energy), 9 (Industry, infrastructure and innovation) and 11 (Sustainable cities and communities).
The event was opened with a heartwarming welcome and opening remarks from Ms. Shilpa Lamichhane, Executive Director of Visible Impact. Ms. Medha Sharma, President of Visible Impact gave a powerful keynote speech, inspiring youths to keep engaging on SDG issues. Madan Rokaya, from Blind Youth Association Nepal moderated the whole event. Similarly, different SDG themes were skillfully moderated by youth activists who were also a part of NAYA Working Group Members. Sign language interpreters were present to facilitate the session for deaf participants.
The objective of the forum was to draw the perspectives of youths on different SDGs and identify their recommendations to accelerate the progress. The final recommendations compiled from the forum will be used to feed into Nepal People’s Forum and other sub-regional and regional fora on SDGs.
Pre-COP event
On 31st October 2025, Nepal APFSD Youth Alliance (NAYA) co-organized a pre-COP session in collaboration with Clean Energy Nepal, Nepalese Youth for Climate Action, World’s Youth for Climate Justice, Visible Impact, Harin Nepal, DanChurchAid in Nepal, Blind Youth Association Nepal, Youth Action for Sustainable and Eco Nepal, and LI-BIRD.
The session conducted a youth discussion at Sap Falcha where about 50 youths participated. Discussion was held around the COP-30 process and youth engagement on it. Also, the intersectional issues on climate change like Gender and Health, Just Transition, Mountain Ecosystems, Indigenous voices etc. were also discussed briefly.
As an outcome of discussion, a recommendation paper was prepared with all points from the session discussed.
With the recommendation prepared, the youths went to Ministry of Forests and Environment (MoFE) at Singha Durbar, Kathmandu. Dr. Maheshwar Dhakal, Joint Secretary at MoFE facilitated the session and presented Nepal’s position paper for COP-30. Further, the Minister of Agriculture and Livestock, Mr. Madan Pariyar, thanked the youths for their efforts, and assured that that their recommendations will be considered on their position paper. He also requested the youths to provide any suggestions from youth perspectives for the Minister’s speech at COP. Few youths including Dipika Lama from NIDWAN and Dipesh Limbu from Visible Impact also delivered their recommendations on making climate change policies more inclusive and gender-responsive and integrating indigenous knowledge to deal with climate change issues.
Participation in sub-regional fora on SDGs
Shilpa Lamichhane, ED of Visible Impact attended 28th Sustainable Development Conference in Islamabad, Pakistan from 4-6 November, and delivered her speech representing the engagement of youths in SDG review process.
Seejan Lamichhhane from NAYA participated in Virtual Subregional Consultation on advancing SDG 6, 7, 9, 11 and 17 organized by ESCAP Sub-regional Office for South and Southwest Asia and gave her remarks representing the CSOs from Nepal.
In addition, The South Asia CSOs Forum 2025 was organized under the Asia Pacific Regional CSO Engagement Mechanism (APRCEM) as part of the preparations for the 9th South and South-West Asia Sub-Regional Forum on Sustainable Development. Visible Impact Nepal, serving as the host organization for the South Asia constituency, facilitated the event as the technical host and coordination team.
Impact
The main outcome of NAYA I is that we were able to bring many youths from Nepal under one roof to advocate for the SDGs implementation in Nepal, giving them an opportunity to interact with key decision-makers and put forward their suggestions and recommendations. The government officials also gave their commitment to engaging youth at the forefront of the Sustainable Development Agenda at their respective workplaces and areas of work during the High-Level Dialogue. The outcome of the program was documented as a Call to Action. The recommendations gathered during the National Youth Conclave were used to feed in to prepare a Nepal-specific call to action during the APFSD 2022.
As NAYA keeps completing its new phases, its milestones kept increasing. The number of members has increased to more than 200 now. The number of reaches is increasing in social media which means more youths are getting educated on climate change, CSE and SDG through our infographics and contests. The alliance had made better networks and has collaborated with wider ranges of other youth-led organizations. The participation of NAYA representatives in regional and international fora is continued. The amount of youths interested to engage in activities like Nepal Youth Forum and Pre-COP events have increased.
This year, NAYA will also be one of the organizers of Nepal People’s Forum where the goal profiles constructed from Nepal Youth Forum will be further consolidated.
