On the eve of the year of older persons, a world ministerial conference on the young ... and, thanks to Portugal, at no cost to the United Nations.

• Author: Grabish, Beatrice

The "World Conference of Ministers Responsible for Youth", held from 8 to 12 August in Lisbon, Portugal, produced an important document-the Lisbon Declaration-which commits its signatories to elevate youth policy on their national agendas and, in the phrase of John Langmore, Director of the Division for Social Policy and Development at the United Nations Headquarters in New York, sets up "manageable, time-bound goals for setting up national youth strategies".

Despite the good intentions of all present, several obstacles impeding the implementation of effective youth policy still remain. Most youth ministers, says Mr. Langmore, are fairly junior, which means that they often do "not have a lot of political weight. And therefore youth issues tend to get less attention than a lot of other issues". Moreover, older people tend to have much more political clout than young people, especially in industrialized countries. As a result, "there tends to be some disproportion in services provided to the two groups", according to Mr. Langmore. "Countries where resources are limited - and that's true of every country to a greater or lesser extent - there has to be some attempt at balance between the various groups in the community. And it's important not to neglect youth in that context."

(1999 has been designated as the Year of Older Persons by the United Nations. Look for an article in this regard in...