Creating opportunities for youth marred by war ensures new hope for their future

af DRC Dansk Flygtningehjælp

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Lebanese and Syrian youth engaged in a constructive dialogue training in Saida, Lebanon. Photo: Aleph Strategies

The situation in Lebanon is continuously devastating and a multitude of hardships is challenging the country with the world’s largest number of refugees per capita. The large, young population is marked by increasing disillusion and hopelessness. With support from Novo Nordisk Foundation, DRC Danish Refugee Council will be able to work with and for Syrian refugee and host community youth in Lebanon to improve their conditions and opportunity space for a life in dignity.

Disillusion and hopelessness are severe among youth in Lebanon. To tackle the multifaceted problems facing vulnerable youth in Lebanon DRC Danish Refugee Council and partners will design a holistic approach to empowerment reaching 2,760 youth and their families and engaging the wider ecosystem of stakeholders to ensure a systemic and sustainable improvement of conditions for Syrian refugee and host community youth. 

The title of the intervention, CHASE, is the abbreviation of keywords formulated by youth in Lebanon: Capable, Hopeful, Accepted, Safe and Engaged.
Based on experience from the RYSE-project in Jordan, implemented by DRC Danish Refugee Council and supported by the Novo Nordisk Foundation, the effort in Lebanon will adapt the Graduation Approach to the Lebanese context.

Listening to the voice of youth
By combining elements of social protection, livelihoods development, and access to finance for youth and their families, the project will develop a comprehensive and scalable model for young people to become empowered and capable of reaching their aspirations. 

Direct participation of youth is key to the project and will inform the programming and creation of enabling environments, that bring public and private actors to play.

To broaden the much-needed opportunity space the project will explore new mechanisms of investments though engagement of Syrian and Lebanese diaspora networks. Research based advocacy and policy initiatives to affect long term change and represent youth voices will further mobilize local, national, and international actors to create opportunities for youth.

A project engaging local partners
The effort will focus on vulnerable Syrian and Lebanese youth in the North and the Bekaa governorates, with special attention to gender specific challenges.

The project is supported by the Novo Nordisk Foundation and developed with long-term and strategic partners of DRC Danish Refugee Council: Al Majmoua specialized in providing financial literacy and inclusion services, and Fair-Trade Lebanon (FTL), specialized in agricultural technical training and production services in rural settings.