Filipino Youth Advancing Climate Action

Girls and Youth Driving Unified Climate Action

At the forefront of Plan International’s work, girls are actively involved in emergency planning, and climate action, ensuring their voices, experiences, and leadership guide the decisions that shape their lives. By empowering girls to lead and make meaningful choices, communities become safer, more inclusive, and more resilient.

Since 2022, these girls, along with other youth representatives from Navotas and Manila, actively participated in and led community resilience enhancing activities under the Alliance. These included community risk mapping activities, capacity building sessions, and contingency planning at the barangay level.

On March 4, 2026, at the Climate Resilience Multi-stakeholder Forum, youth representatives joined Local Government Units (LGU) and barangay representatives, civil society, and development partners to discuss strategies for reducing climate risks through community resilience. The forum served as a platform to coordinate programming, share knowledge, and drive joint advocacy efforts to protect communities against intensifying climate impacts. 

“It's important that we, as young people, have a voice to convey our problems, our best practices, and our accomplishments. And of course, it's important that we represent the youth's voice in our barangay.” said Vincent and Kim, Navotas youth advocates and community resilience champions during their joint presentation forum.

During the event, Plan International, the Philippine Red Cross (PRC) and the International Federation of the Red Cross and Red Crescent (IFRC) officially signed the Terms of Reference establishing a national coordination platform under the Alliance. This platform will enable partners to coordinate programming, share knowledge, and drive joint advocacy efforts to protect communities against intensifying climate impacts.

Youth Leadership for a Resilient Future

Navotas and Manila are highly urbanized cities that experience extreme flooding and storm surges due to their low-lying coastal and riverside communities. Flooding is also worsened by rapid urbanization and poor solid waste management. To address these challenges, youth leaders were engaged by the Alliance to strengthen community flood resilience. They also joined Plan International Pilipinas’s Youth Advisory Panel (YAP), a platform for young people to participate in local decision-making concerning policies and programs that directly impact their communities. The goal is to ensure youth voices are integrated into policies and programs that directly impact their communities.

The day after the forum, Kim and Vincent led community visits across project areas in Navotas City, guiding transect walks in their barangays. They demonstrated early warning systems they had helped establish, including hazard maps and water level markings, and shared insights on how their communities continue to face climate risks. Their leadership highlighted the critical role of youth-driven solutions in strengthening local resilience. Joined by Alliance partners from the PRC and the IFRC, the visit demonstrated how youth, local governments, and humanitarian organizations can work together to build safer, more resilient communities.

Empowering youth is key to building climate-resilient communities. Let’s continue to support and invest in youth-led initiatives and collaborate across sectors to drive inclusive and sustainable climate action for a safer future for all.