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Disability

Excerpt from the 2006 Sustainability Review:

Approximately 15 percent of the region's population lives with a disability. Physical barriers and social stigmas are a common obstacle to the inclusion of persons with disability in the workplace, in the education system, in health care facilities, and other social settings. The Bank has therefore committed to the inclusion of persons with disability in the work it funds. In 2006, the IDB approved four technical cooperation grants focusing on persons with disability, with a total value of $765,000. Two of the grants are helping to create job opportunities in Peru and Nicaragua for persons with disability, particularly women who face additional gender discrimination. A third grant was approved to build community capacities for managing disability in Argentina, and the final grant was aimed at strengthening the advocacy skills of organizations working with disabled people.

Efforts to assist persons with disability have been hampered by a lack of data on the prevalence and socioeconomic impact of disability at the household and individual level. For the past five years, the Bank has supported increased access to disability data, and is beginning to observe the impact of this investment: 20 countries in the region are now including disability questions in censuses and surveys. In 2007, the IDB will focus on linking data to policy. Policy reviews on inclusive education and labor market participation are underway in Andean and Central American countries. In addition, the Bank is committed to analyzing its loan portfolio of education and labor market projects approved from 1990 to 2006 to document IDB's experience in disability work. This will greatly improve the Bank's capacity to benchmark best practices.