Ekaterinburg will host 10,000 participants for the International Festival of Youth from Sept. 11 to 17, serving as the primary venue for the BRICS+ International Youth Mentoring Program and the III BRICS Women’s Entrepreneurship Forum.
The festival, part of the Youth and Children national project, will feature special sessions for young professionals and entrepreneurs. The III BRICS Women’s Entrepreneurship Forum, scheduled for Sept. 15 to 16, will convene more than 200 participants, including business leaders, senior executives, government officials, academic and research representatives, and young entrepreneurs from over 20 countries. The itinerary includes panel discussions, expert interviews, workshops, master classes, multimedia exhibits, and film screenings.
Organised by the World Youth Festival Directorate and the BRICS Women’s Business Alliance, the hybrid BRICS+ Mentoring Program received 550 applications from more than 30 countries in 2026. Running until Dec. 18, 2026, the programme aims to help Russian and international professionals develop skills, exchange experiences, and receive mentorship support for their projects.
“Today there is a wide range of mechanisms in place to support business initiatives, including projects launched by young entrepreneurs. Among them are our Mentoring Program and the BRICS Women’s Business Alliance, with its full toolkit of resources,” noted Anna Nesterova, mentor of the BRICS+ Mentoring Program, chairperson of the BRICS WBA Russian Chapter, and founder of the Palekh Watch watchmaking manufactory.
On Aug. 24, a major block of online modules within the mentoring programme concluded. Thirty participants from 12 countries—Brazil, Venezuela, Guatemala, India, Indonesia, Iran, China, Russia, Tajikistan, Uganda, Ethiopia, and South Africa—completed four of the six planned stages. Having attended lectures, completed practical assignments, and analysed Russian and international case studies, more than 85% of participants rated the modules highly for quality and practical value.
At the upcoming festival, participants will present their projects, learn the programme’s interim results, and meet their mentors in person for the first time. The mentors include leading experts and company executives from Russia, Brazil, Egypt, South Africa, Iran, Indonesia, Kazakhstan, and India.
“The best investment you can make when you are young is an investment in your own education. A diploma can open a door, but it is ongoing learning, curiosity, and a willingness to pick up new skills that let you create opportunities that did not exist before. The five-hour rule: set aside at least five hours a week for your own development – learning new technologies, reading professional literature, taking courses, or talking with experts. The compounding effect of continuous learning becomes, over time, your greatest competitive advantage and your most reliable asset in a fast-changing world,” said Aizhan Ashimova, mentor of the BRICS+ Mentoring Program, education entrepreneur, and book writer.
The participants have developed initiatives across fields such as biomedical technology, aviation systems, creative industries, fintech, and social entrepreneurship. Russia’s Lyubov Aksyonova created an AI platform for diagnosing eye diseases that automatically analyses retinal images to detect 12 pathologies. Sabrina Maciel of Brazil runs an agricultural company helping farmers boost crop yields using drones, mapping, and software. Indonesia’s Dela Novita Sari developed a platform to preserve local languages by offering courses, video lessons, games, and text translation.
“Remember: it is easier to prevent a fire than to put one out. In business, that means investing your energy in preventing crises, not in heroically overcoming them. A true professional is not seen at the moment of putting out the fire, but in how they organize their work so that the fire never happens in the first place,” noted Elena Chashchina, co-owner and managing partner of the EPOTOS Group of Companies and a member of the BRICS WBA Russian Chapter.
The Ekaterinburg event continues the legacy of the World Youth Festival (WYF), following a decree by Russian President Vladimir Putin on the development of international youth cooperation that established annual festival events across the Russian Federation.
The directorate’s previous events include the WYF-2024, held in Sirius from March 1-7, which brought together 20,000 young leaders from 190 countries, and the 2025 World Youth Festival Assembly in Nizhny Novgorod, which hosted 2,000 young people from 120 countries. The directorate stated it continues its work to strengthen international youth cooperation, with the next large-scale World Youth Festival for 20,000 participants planned for 2030.
