"As usual!" the Vice-President of the European Commission remarked, after listening to the demands of the youth representatives - among them participants of Young Ideas for Europe who took part in the international conference "Sustaining People and the Planet: a Fair Deal in Copenhagen." The event was held by the Road to Copenhagen Initiative in Malmö, Sweden on December 8-9, 2009. More than 150 participants representing civil society, business and legislators gathered to explore the necessary drivers for ensuring that the deal reached at Copenhagen be based on climate justice: human rights, technology transfer and financial mechanisms which ensure fair burden sharing. The Road to Copenhagen Initiative is chaired by Margot Wallström, Margot Brundtland and Mary Robinson.

Young Ideas for Europe was, together with the Global Humanitarian Forum's Youth Forum and Save the Children, invited to make the voice of young people actively heard at the conference. A delegation of eight participants from the Czech Republic, France, Germany, Hungary, Poland, Slovakia, Slovenia and Sweden jumped at the opportunity and voiced their opinions in the conference workshops on climate justice, financing and technology. These were chaired by the three prestigious patrons of the initiative. An even better opportunity for the young participants to present their ideas about the challenge of climate change was then offered to them in the form of their own workshop. Hosted by the Youth Forum and Young Ideas for Europe, the event focussed on intergenerational dialogue and the demands of the Youth Forum's "Copenhagen Manifesto" were complemented with concrete ideas of how to implement them. Small lively discussions groups drew up the results; among the participants were Gro Harlem Brundtland and Mary Robinson, together with the young people. The discussions were moderated by representatives of the Youth Forum.

The results: the revised nine demands of the "Copenhagen Manifesto" are listed below. These were then presented by the youngsters themselves in the conference's plenary and served as an introduction to the discussions on the Road to Copenhagen initiative's final communiqué. Again, the chairwomen were impressed by the quality of the work of the young people.

Straight after the conference, the three chairwomen went to the COP15 in Copenhagen to hand over the conference's messages and communiqué to the UNFCCC Secretary General Yvo de Boer. Upon receiving the communiqué he strongly recommended delivering these recommendations to all Ministers and Heads of State and Government that will be arriving at the COP15 in the coming days. ”It is a strong sign of encouragement to them to really live up to public participation from the young, businesses, and parliamentarians, and to do something here in Copenhagen that is significant.”

Not only did the Young Ideas for Europe participants manage to gain valuable experience through the "Sustaining People and the Planet" conference in Malmö, through their participation in the COP 15 as accredited observers they were able to approach a wide range of organisations and institutions and gain new insights and new ideas.

See a video from the press conference and our photos on Flickr Part 1 / Part 2 and facebook!

Click here for the Final Communique!