At 27, Erika Mateus knows what it means to face uncertainty about the future. 

Born in Pemba, the capital of Cabo Delgado province in northern Mozambique, Erika has spent the past six months working as a Project Assistant with Associação Nunisa, one of the civil society partners implementing the Resilient Investment for Socio-Economic Empowerment, Peace and Security (RISE-PS) Project in Palma district. 

Her work takes her into communities where expectations are often met with caution. For many of the people attending her sessions, skepticism is understandable. Previous initiatives have sometimes raised hopes without delivering the opportunities communities expected. Erika and her colleagues therefore begin not with promises, but with listening. 

Through community sensitization sessions, open dialogue, and clear communication, they explain what RISE-PS Project can and cannot deliver. More importantly, they create space for people to voice their concerns, ask questions, and share their experiences. 

Step by step, these conversations help rebuild confidence.   

Erika understands the frustration many young people experience when opportunities appear distant or unattainable. She has faced moments when uncertainty could easily have overshadowed ambition and hope. Those experiences shaped her determination to support others. She made a promise to herself: whenever she had an opportunity to help young people build a better future, she would take it. 

Today, she keeps that promise. Erika is helping young people and communities explore pathways towards greater socioeconomic empowerment, while contributing to the broader effort to strengthen resilience, peace, and security in Palma. Her work is creating conversations where there was mistrust, building confidence where there was uncertainty, and helping people recognize opportunities where they once saw obstacles. 

She sees every conversation as a small step towards a future in which young people can see themselves not only as beneficiaries of development, but as agents of change in their own communities. 

Erika’s work is shaped by the reality of Cabo Delgado, a province that has endured years of conflict and instability, and where restoring hope remains urgent. Since 2017, violence has claimed an estimated 4,500 lives, displaced more than one million people and destroyed more than 4,900 local businesses. For many young people, opportunities remain scarce, with youth unemployment standing at 25 per cent. In communities still recovering, finding a job, starting a business or making plans for the future can feel beyond reach. 

It is against this backdrop that the RISE-PS Project is working to create new possibilities. 

Funded by the African Development Bank (AfDB) and co-funding from the Government of Mozambique and UNDP, RISE-PS is helping create jobs, strengthen livelihoods and expand economic opportunities for young people and women in Palma and Ancuabe districts. Yet its ambition extends beyond economic recovery. By addressing some of the underlying drivers of vulnerability and exclusion, the project is supporting communities to rebuild their livelihoods and their prospects for the future. 

For Erika, these ambitions come to life through her daily interactions with community members. Working in the field has challenged her. It has inspired her. And, along the way, it has revealed strengths she did not know she possessed. 

“I didn’t know I had mediation skills,” she says. “But in the field, I discovered them, and every day I come to discover new capabilities I never imagined I had.” 

That discovery has strengthened Erika’s belief in the transformative power of opportunity. Having experienced her own frustrations as a young person, she understands how important it is for young people to see a path forward, to know that their circumstances do not have to define their future. It is why she hopes initiatives like RISE-PS can reach more communities across Cabo Delgado, bringing opportunities closer to young people who need them most. 

Her message to other young people is direct, personal and grounded in experience: 

“Keep fighting and always searching for opportunities, don’t stop, and don’t let negative thoughts speak louder than you. Always have faith.” 

This year’s International Youth Day theme, “Different Contexts, Common Aspirations,” speaks directly to Erika’s story. 

Young people may grow up in vastly different circumstances, but their aspirations are often the same: the opportunity to learn, to work, to contribute and to build a better future. 

In Cabo Delgado, Erika is helping make aspirations more tangible through the everyday work of listening, engaging and opening pathways to opportunity. One conversation at a time. One opportunity at a time. 

Read more: 

• LinkedIn: UNDP Pemba Sub-Office Signs Agreements with 6 Civil Society Organizations
• Press Release: AfDB and UNDP Join Mozambique in Launching Flagship Project to Support Post‑Conflict Recovery and Economic Empowerment