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1. Governance

2. Cross-sectoral cooperation

Governance

The main actor involved in policy-making on youth work is the Youth Board of Cyprus. According to the Youth Board’s Law (available only in Greek), the Administrative Board of the Youth Board of Cyprus advises the Council of Ministers through the Minister of Education, Culture, Youth and Sports, for the development of a comprehensive and targeted youth policy that promotes the following aims:

• the progress and prosperity of all young people of Cyprus, regardless of ethnicity origin or religion;
• the provision of opportunities to all young people and their organizations for participation and for taking responsibility in the social, economic and cultural development;
• the creative engagement of young people in Cyprus;
• the immediate and effective encounter of the problems youth are facing.

The main non-public actors involved are the Cyprus Youth Council, the Cyprus Youth Clubs Organization and the Municipal and Community Youth Councils. The role of the Cyprus Youth Council is to voice the concerns of youth NGOs including lobbying to policy makers for a number of youth related issues. The role of the Municipal and Community Youth Councils is to advice their local authorities and recommend solution-policies and actions in regard to problems that young people face in relation to the community. The Cyprus Youth Clubs Organisation  is the largest non-governmental youth non-profit organization in Cyprus. Youth Clubs are independent non-governmental, non-profit, non-partisan voluntary youth organizations that provide creative engagement, information and entertainment opportunities to young people and are open to all youth. They collaborate closely with the Youth Board of Cyprus in order to reach better the young people all over the country, especially in rural areas.

Regarding the general distribution of responsibilities between top-level and regional/local authorities, for every youth work programme, the Youth Board of Cyprus collaborates on an ad hoc basis with the respective local authority for its implementation.

Cross-sectoral cooperation

Cross-sectoral cooperation between the Youth Board of Cyprus, the Ministry of Education, Youth and Sports,  the Human Resource Development Agency, the local authorities, and the main non-public actors involved in youth work is ensured through the National Youth Strategy. The National Youth Strategy endorses a strong cross-sectoral cooperation between the above-mentioned parties that stretches also in the field of youth work.

Moreover, in 2020, the Youth Board of Cyprus established a dedicated Working Group on Youth Work, with representatives of  the  Youth Board , the Ministry of Education, Sports and Youth,  the Cyprus Youth Council and the Cyprus Youth Clubs Organisation, with the mandate to work on the development of an action plan for the holistic and quality development of youth work in Cyprus.