GLB-C03-2026
Dear friends,
The United Nations (UN) General Assembly has declared 2026 as the International Year of Volunteers for Sustainable Development (IVY), creating a unique opportunity to promote and recognise volunteers as a driving force for community and sustainable development. Value volunteering is also a key strategic priority for the Scout Movement, as highlighted in our Strategy for Scouting. This includes an ambitious target to increase the number of volunteers involved in Scouting by 1.5 million - or roughly 30% - by 2033.
Of the Scout Movement’s more than 60 million members worldwide, an estimated 4.5 million are adult volunteers, each contributing to the learning environment that enables young people to grow and develop. Despite this strong foundation, many National Scout Organizations (NSOs) struggle to find enough adult volunteers to serve as Scout Leaders to run the Scouting programme. As a result, hundreds of thousands of young people are currently on waiting lists as groups are unable to accept new members without more leaders. This is largely due to difficulties in recruiting, training, and retaining volunteers, as well as the need for greater flexibility and new ways to contribute.
IVY 2026 offers us the opportunity to explore this important topic in depth and to work internally and with partners to identify ways to give volunteering the prominence and value it deserves, ensuring it becomes a key factor in Scouting’s development and growth.
To mark IVY 2026, World Scouting is launching a number of initiatives, awareness campaigns, and capacity-strengthening support at the global and regional level with the intention to:
- Develop a deeper understanding of the profile of our adult volunteers, reflecting the full diversity of how Scouting operates around the world.
- Strengthen recognition efforts so that adult volunteers feel genuinely valued and supported.
- Examine the evolving landscape of volunteering and how Scouting can adapt its volunteer models to remain relevant and accessible.
- Improve internal systems and structures to better support adult volunteers across the diverse contexts in which they serve.
- Position Scouting externally as a meaningful, high-impact opportunity for adult volunteering.
- Elevate the profile of volunteering both within the Scout Movement and externally, including through efforts that can help shape and inform public policy.
These initiatives aim to complement ongoing projects under the World Triennial Plan in the areas of volunteering and Adults in Scouting.
We encourage all NSOs to join this collective effort and integrate opportunities to make IVY 2026 a year dedicated to valuing our volunteers and strengthening the practices and systems that support them. In doing so, we can better attract, retain, and support the adults who help deliver our mission of supporting the growth and development of young people and the communities they serve.
NSOs can take part by accessing UN Volunteers’ communications guide and Trello board from, as well as a new campaign toolkit developed by World Scouting in our Brand Centre. For more resources about volunteering, please visit the Learning Zone or ScoutShip, our one-stop hub for knowledge, tools, and templates for managing Adults in Scouting.
If you have any questions about Adults in Scouting or the International Year of Volunteers, please contact Jorge Salas Cuzquen, Manager of Membership and Capacity Building at the World Scout Bureau by email at [email protected].
Yours in Scouting,
David Berg
Secretary General
World Scouting