On November 8th, 2022, UNODA (United Nations Office for Disarmament Affairs) hosted another informative “Vienna Conversation Series Event.” Many phenomenal ideas were mentioned throughout the session, however, we wanted to focus this article on the remarkable Vice-Chair of Prague Vision Institute and Co-Convener of Youth Fusion, Ms. Vanda Proskova.

Ms. Vanda Proskova raised a significant issue often overlooked or unexplored with nuclear weapons. Globally, nuclear weapons budgets is collectively amount to about $100 billion per year. Another shocking fact: while the world was in a social, political, and economic crisis, nuclear powers allocated 72.6 billion US dollars to nuclear weapon production in 2020, with the United States accounting for 37.4 billion dollars of this expenditure. In response to this concerning issue, Ms. Vanda Proska gave an inspiring suggestion to the non-proliferation and disarmament community. “Specifically from the perspective of ‘nuclear divestment’, it is a very good example of how civil society can have a direct impact on policy-making [and] humanitarian disarmament.” According to Oxford’s Dictionary, divestment is defined as “the action or process of selling off subsidiary business interests or investments.” By practicing “divestment” in nuclear weapon production, our government will be de-incentivized to create nuclear weapons. Civilians have the power and ability to influence governments to shift funding to more significant and dire matters. Change is in the hands of youth. Teens4disarmament can be the change our world needs to see.