site.btaDeputy Prime Minister Zafirov Urges Youth and Sports Ministry to Prioritize Youth

The state should implement more comprehensive policies for the development of young people in Bulgaria. Institutions should provide more educational and career prospects according to the participants in a forum on "The forgotten young. How and why did the youth report stop?" on Friday.

The discussion was organized by the Political Movement Social Democrats (PMSD), a coalition partner in the BSP-United Left coalition, in Sofia.

The focus was the lack of a youth report, which was last drawn up in 2020. The demographic crisis, the risks of smoking and the use of illicit substances and the lack of places for development were also discussed at the forum.

“The future of the country depends on the young people in Bulgaria and we need a targeted state policy to support them,” said PMSD Deputy Chairman Georgi Petrov. A report on their status should be prepared every year by the Council of Ministers.

The report has been suspended without any explanation, but it is an essential tool for monitoring adolescents, Petrov said. From 1,150,000 youths as of 2019, their number has fallen to 650,000. State policies have failed to find a solution to this forecast, Petrov said. He also focused on the problem of young people leaving the country. Without regular data and analysis, effective measures to encourage young Bulgarians to stay in the country cannot be developed, Petrov said.

“We need to work to build a comprehensive approach to youth that is based on data,” said Maria Yurukova, adviser to the president on domestic policy and civil society.

 “We say that young people are a priority, but obviously they are not,” said Atanas Radev, chairman of the National Youth Forum (NYF).

Deputy Prime Minister and BSP leader Atanas Zafirov said that youth issues should be a top or at least an equal priority in the work of the Ministry of Youth and Sports. a coalition partner in the BSP-United Left coalition.

The public has the perception that this ministry deals only with the problems of sport, while youth remain in the background, says Zafirov.

Youth issues require an integrated approach and interaction between institutions, Zafirov said. He will request information from the Minister why the youth report has been suspended for five years. “I am not surprised that it is in this period 2020 - 2025 that this “freeze” has occurred, because these are the last years of the severe political crisis, a cycle of constant snap elections, caretaker governments that dealt with everything but policies, much less in the field of youth,” Zafirov said.

Every fifth young person in Bulgaria is neither studying nor working, and youth unemployment in Bulgaria is 10% higher than the EU average, said political science student Maya Pancheva.

The forum was attended by representatives of the National Youth Forum and others.