Advancing the Disability Agenda in the IDB[1]
April 20, 2006
Co-Sponsored by the Social Development Division
of the Sustainable Development Department
(SDS/SOC)
and the Social Inclusion Trust Fund
Mr. Ferroni, Deputy Manager of SDS, offered a warm
welcome to all participants and to the four country offices connected via video
conference.
Session 1: IDB and World Bank on Disability and
Development
Ms.
Wanda Engel Aduan, Division Chief of SDS/SOC, served as moderator of the first
session on: 1) How the World Bank is advancing the issue of disability in
development, 2) What the IDB is doing on Disability and Development, and 3)
Results from the SDS Initiative on Disability Statistics. Ms. Engel emphasized
the importance of understanding disability as one main characteristic for
exclusion, and encouraged extended cooperation between the Disability and
Development Team in SDS/SOC and the regional departments in offering support in
the project design phase of projects in this area.
Daniel
Mont briefed the audience on what disability in a development context is: a
matter of exclusion and poverty. Persons with disability (PWD) are at higher
risk of falling into poverty, and in a vicious circle, poverty leads to more
disability by increasing people’s vulnerability to malnutrition, disease, and
unsafe living and working conditions. Any meaningful poverty reduction program
or project must therefore consider the resources of persons with disability.
Mont
explained how the work on Disability and Development has evolved at the World
Bank, and he expressed that WB priorities were to:
§
Mainstream
disability issues in project design and implementation
§
Improve analysis on
disability data and social and economic inclusion
§
Promote human and
institutional capacity to address disability issues among Bank staff
Mont
emphasized that inclusive education was one of the areas in which the WB had
focused efforts in the first instance to include disability in the project
portfolio.
On
data, the WB was implementing disability surveys in Africa, Asia and Eastern
Europe. In Latin America, WB has been cooperating with the IDB and Washington
City Group on Disability Statistics to collect data and improve data
comparability.
In
accordance with the priorities identified at the Annual Meeting in Chile, 2002,
the Disability and Development Team is still guided by the same priorities:
§
Universal design in
transport and urban development - Area of Bank expertise
§
Labor Market
Participation - Emerging Area
§
Inclusive Education
- Emerging Area
§
Data Collection -
SDS Initiative on Disability Statistics
In
2005, the IDB had 26 technical cooperations under implementation, covering the sectors mentioned above and in
addition private sector development, reform and modernization of the state, and
capacity building of local disability NGOs. The accumulated value amounts over
US$4 million. The entire project portfolio is available online at: http://www.iadb.org/sds/soc/site_6217_e.htm
SDS
Initiative on Disability Statistics had two objectives: 1) to collect and improve access to disability
data, and 2) to support the harmonization of a disability definition.
In
achieving the first objective, the Bank organized 6 sub-regional meeting from
2003 to 2005, covering the Andean region, the Caribbean, Central America, and
the Southern Cone countries. Representatives of national statistical
institutes, disability NGOs, and national disability councils attended the
meetings. The Bank has worked closely with the Washington City Group on
Disability Data, the World Bank, CEPAL, Andean Community, and CARICOM in this
work. The initiative has allowed us to know more about the demographic and
economic characteristics of PWD.[2]
Definitions and techniques used to measure disability
prevalence vary greatly between and within countries. Recently, there has been
a shift from impairment-based to activity-based disability definitions. The
first identifies the presence of a sensory or physical impairment (blind, deaf,
mute, paralysis, etc.), whereas the second focuses on a person’s ability to
perform basic activities and essential life skills (walking, speaking, seeing,
taking personal care, performing a job etc.) The two definitions provide vastly
different prevalence estimates and as a result comparability is difficult. The
IDB is actively supporting the harmonization of disability definitions for the
improvement of data comparability.
Georgina
Pizzolitto presented data and statistics about persons with disability for the
Latin America and the Caribbean countries. Pizzolitto presented information on
disability by country as it relates to poverty, age, gender, ethnicity,
education, rural/urban, income and labor force participation.
Some data results: Higher prevalence rate among indigenous and
Afrodescendants. Data from Brazil, Costa Rica and Chile support this
finding in showing that the Afrodescendants and indigenous populations have
higher disability prevalence rates than the rest of the population.
Higher illiteracy rates among
PWDs, particularly among children and youth. The most common reasons are: lack
of money, inaccessible infrastructure and transportation, inadequate
institutional accommodation (legislation, special schools, etc.) and, potential
problems of stigma and discrimination by teachers and other students.
The statistics presented also
showed a significant lower participation of PWD in the labor market. Around 65%
of PWD are economically inactive and the figure is even higher among women with
disability.
Data
suggests that disability and poverty are closely linked. In a self-reinforcing
relationship, PWD are disproportionately poor, and those living in poverty are
disproportionately disabled. As a consequence, a significant proportion of PWDs
belong to households in the lowest ranges of the income distribution.
Pizzolitto finished her presentation by including some data on access to health
services and social inclusion of persons with disability.
The
objective of Maria Teresa Traverso’s presentation was to present the experience
of the project ‘Labor Training for the Blind Population’. The project
assisted blind populations in
Argentina, Chile and Uruguay to find jobs and to improve their employability
and productivity by offering them training and by strengthening the
participating organizations of the blind.
The three year program was designed
with technical support from Foundation for Latin America of the National Organization of Blind Spaniards (FOAL) and
had three components: (i) institutional strengthening; (ii) training courses
and job placement; and (iii) a communications and dissemination strategy.
In Argentina and Chile activities
were concentrated around insertion of blind persons in companies and the
results surpassed the expected goals of the project. In Uruguay, blind persons
were mostly offered internships. It was generally recognized that in some
activities the performance of a blind person was higher than that of other
employees, and as a consequence they changed their selection criteria. More
than 2300 blind persons participated in the project in Chile, while in
Argentina more than 11.000 kiosk and 16 microenterprises were created.
In conclusion, the program assisted
blind persons to demonstrate to
employers their abilities, capacities and qualifications to function as good
workers. In addition, the project helped raise public awareness that visual
impairment is not a limitation for joining the work force.
Julieta
Trías presented an overview of social activities on disability in Region 1
(Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Paraguay, Uruguay). The presentation focused
particularly on Chile where a legislative project is under implementation.
After a short description of the situation of persons with disabilities in
Chile and the political context embedding disability issues, Trías went on to state
the strategic objectives on disability for Chile:
§
To include
disability in the political dialogue preceding the development of Country
Strategy Papers
§
To include
disability in the Country Strategy Papers
§
Continue a positive
dialogue with national and international actors on disability pertaining to
Chile
(Time
did not allow for Brakarz’s full presentation) In very few words José Brakarz
commented on the recently developed Guidelines for Accessibility in projects
on transportation and urban environment. A copy of the Guidelines was
included in the folders. Please take a look at them and visit the website for
future reference: http://www.iadb.org/sds/SOC/publication/gen_6191_4180_e.htm
In
concluding the meeting, Carmen Albertos summarized the three presentations of
case studies and placed them in an overall context of how the Bank is doing in
terms of mainstreaming inclusion in various sectors essential to persons with
disabilities.
Loans or Technical Cooperations: A question was directed at Daniel Mont
regarding the type of financing to disability issues. Mont responded that the
majority of assistance was provided in technical cooperations, but that
increasingly loans were also financed in which the main component addressed
disability issues. These were primarily in social protection and education.
Subsequently, Sanne Tikjoeb added that the IDB has yet to finance a loan
specifically addressing disability.
Data Comparability: Jose Antonio Mejia-Guerra, MECOVI, highlighted the
danger of comparing disability data, as most of data is not collected in a
comparable manner. Mejia-Guerra noted that the statistical picture is easily
distorted when looking behind the numbers.
Country Strategies: Katherine Sanchez, External Relations, suggested that
the Disability and Development Team pursue more aggressively the option of
getting disability included into the country strategy process. Wanda Engel
supported the suggestion, and Nicaragua was identified as a potential target
country.
Capacity
Building: Another approach to
advancing the social inclusion of persons with disability is through the
development and implementation of Guidelines. The objectives of these
guidelines should be to highlight key issues for enhancing the social inclusion
of persons with disability, particularly in projects on education,
transportation, labor market, etc.
Inclusive
Education: Carmen Albertos
mentioned the importance of inclusive education as a way to bring awareness
about the topic and reach equal levels of education for children and youth with
disability. Albertos highlighted the need for strategies and investments in
accessibility, human resources and other aspects of implementation to
strengthen effectiveness.
Disability
Awareness and Sensitivity: Create
greater awareness among Latin America and Caribbean leaders and decision makers
of the economic and social importance of policies that seek the inclusion of
persons with disabilities.
Civil
Society: Strengthen the capacity
of civil society groups to better integrate disability-related concerns into
national development initiatives. Organize meetings and extend invitations to
civil society organization as a way to strengthen the relationship between the
Bank and NGOs.
Projects revision:
Some projects of the Bank, could be revised and adjusted in order to consider
in their goals, persons with disability.
Dissemination: Promote and organize events to disseminate Bank
actions on disability and development. Also, extending participation to the countries offices, civil society and
decision makers to promote the importance of the inclusion of persons with
disability.