YMCA in Hong Kong: The World Council and International Youth Forum YMCAs met early August in Hong Kong for the 17th World Council of YMCAs. World Councils are the largest official gatherings of the World Alliance, with over 600 participants attending this year!

Organized around the of “Striving for Global Citizenship for All”, this event engaged participants in dialogue and sharing on some of the most critical challenges within and outside the Movement. The objective of the workshop was to develop a global framework and perspective on Global Citizenship, taking into account the diverse experiences of YMCAs in implementing Global Citizenship programmes.

The World Council meeting was preceded by an International Youth Forum held July 17 – 19 in the same venue. Gathering around the same theme as the World Council, theYMCA International Youth Forum asserted the need for global citizenship as a framework to help young people address contemporary global challenges and strengthen the momentum to ensuring the realisation of the Millennium Development Goals by 2015.

The Youth Forum also provided training to prepare youth delegates for active participation at the World Council. Exciting programme elements included a video competition, festival of good practices and public music concert.

Helene Weir, President and CEO of YMCA Calgary, Brian Lemke, Board Chair, and Koray Demirbag from the Eau Claire YMCA went through an application process and were very honoured to be selected to represent YMCA Canada at the World Council. There were 36 delegates in total from Canada, including seven youth - and Koray was one of them.

Kidney March

The YMCA partners with many groups in the community to support healthy lifestyles. One current example is supporting kidney disease awareness; YMCA Calgary is a partner in supporting the Kidney Foundation of Southern Alberta's upcoming Kidney March.

"The March is a 100-kilometer walk on Sept 10-12 to raise funds fo,r and an awareness of, Kidney Disease. Two million Canadians have chronic kidney disease or are at risk. Most people don't know that they are at risk. Most don't know they have it until it's too late. The numbers are growing at an alarming rate. In southern Alberta alone, the number of people living with chronic kidney failure has doubled in the last ten years. 70% of people who are on the organ donor waiting list are waiting for a kidney.

There is no cure.

Kidney disease is irreversible, and each year it kills thousands of Canadians. These numbers are growing. Kidney disease cases are expected to double in the next ten years.

Not only does kidney disease cost enormous amounts of money for our health care system, it devastates individuals and their families. More than half of the people living with kidney disease in southern Alberta live on or below the poverty line. Entire families are impacted when one member has kidney disease, and it's a life-long illness." The YMCA is happy to support the Kidney Foundation in the March and has developed the training guide for participants which also serves as a location for training walks.  Pictured to the right is our training group out for a walk on Saturday. They are led by volunteer walk-leader Shannyn Clancy, from the Community YMCA.

Helene Weir
President & CEO, YMCA Calgary