Cruz Vermelha de Timor-Leste (CVTL or Timor-Leste Red Cross) held the fifth Youth Camp event to ignite the spirit of volunteerism among young volunteers from 30 June to 2 July in Baucau, Timor-Leste. Around 44 young volunteers (aged 12 to 25 years old) participated in this gathering to share experiences, learn new skills and build future youth programming.

The involvement of young volunteers at Timor-Leste Red Cross is crucial to ensure that the services run at the community level. To date, youth programme covers health promotion, HIV/ AIDS campaign and first aid respectively. The volunteers play a pivotal role in educating their peers to practise healthy lifestyle as well as in disseminating disaster risk reduction issues in areas prone to natural disaster.

During the Youth Camp gathering, the volunteers evaluated their programmes and developed new interventions to help more people in need. One new agenda identified is to reach out to vulnerable groups including elderly, children and disabled people in their respective communities. Timor-Leste Red Cross hopes that by targeting vulnerable groups it will strengthen the community based programmes across the country.