The Hindu : Efforts to reduce global poverty must include the disabled

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Dec 03, 2002

Opinion

Opinion - News Analysis

Efforts to reduce global poverty must include the disabled

By James D. Wolfensohn

More than 400 million disabled people live in developing countries. All too often, their lives go hand-in-hand with poverty, isolation, and despair. As the world marks the International Day of Disabled Persons this week, we need to amplify and respond to the voices of those who are not listened to within their own societies. Their disabilities are often used against them to keep them from going to school or finding work or being visible in their own neighbourhoods.

A blind woman in Eastern Europe, with an unmistakable tone of hopelessness, captures the harsh reality of living with disability in this way — ``we depend on everyone; no one wants us. We are like garbage that everyone wants to get rid of.'' As if this isolation was not injurious enough, research shows that the disabled are also disproportionately more likely to live in grinding poverty. Of the more than 1.3 billion people worldwide who struggle to exist on less than a dollar a day, the disabled live at the bottom of the pile. Some form of disability is no rare occurrence.

It can affect 10 to 20 per cent of a country's population, a percentage that is expected to grow because of several trends — poor health care and nutrition early in life, growing elderly populations and violent civil conflict. Drinking bad water and malnutrition can rob people of their eyesight; similarly, earthquakes and other natural disasters take their toll.

HIV/AIDS, measles, polio, traffic accidents, work injuries, discarded explosives, mothers who abuse drugs during pregnancy — all can ravage peoples' hearing, their intellectual and emotional senses, wreck limbs and bodies, relegating millions to the margins of society who otherwise see themselves as potential and willing contributors to family and national economic activity. The result can be devastating, both to the individual and the economy. Accordingly, the disabled must be included in our global efforts to reduce poverty, and increase the development prospects of millions of poor people around the world.

Without bringing the disabled into the mainstream of development, it will be impossible to halve the incidence of poverty by 2015 or to give every girl and boy the chance to achieve primary education by the same date, agreed to by more than 180 world leaders at the United National Millennium Summit in September, 2000. In bringing disability out of the shadows in poor countries, there are several issues we, as a global community, need to face head-on.

First, our goal should be to remove the causes of disability and not, as is often the case, remove the disabled people from public and economic life. If development is all about bringing the excluded people into the society, then the disabled belong in schools, legislatures, at work in offices, in businesses, in their own homes, on buses, at the theatre and everywhere else that those who are not yet disabled take for granted. Secondly, we should acknowledge that disability is an enduring feature of all economies, rich and poor, and incorporate its responses accordingly. Thirdly, most disabilities are preventable; few among the 400 million thought to be living with disability were born that way. They lost their mobility, or their vision, either as children or adults. The international community needs to take a strong leadership role in bringing disability into the development mainstream in a dynamic alliance with the U.N. system, governments, development agencies such as the World Bank, NGOs, the private sector and other groups worldwide. For example, through infrastructure projects and policy support for countries in reducing poverty and boosting economic growth, the World Bank has been increasingly amplifying the concerns for the disabled in its consultations with the developing countries, wealthy donors, civil society, and other stakeholders. While applying the European/U.S. type disability standards across the board in most developing countries is not an affordable answer, poor countries still have options to increase public access for the disabled. It is not an all or nothing situation. For example, in India children with physical and intellectual disabilities between the ages of 5 and 11 are receiving programme support and being served through the District Primary Education Programme. This programme is supported by several donors, including the World Bank, in order to ensure that the Education for All, Millennium Development Goal includes this population.

Donors and development agencies finance substantial infrastructure projects in the developing countries, such as schools and hospitals, streets and paths, transport and power systems, and should encourage design features that improve access for all the people with mobility limitations, including the disabled, pregnant mothers, people carrying baggage, older people (the elderly), and others who currently encounter barriers. Without infrastructure standards and enforcement of standards, inaccessible environments are re-created or maintained. For instance, in the massive reconstruction efforts in Honduras following Hurricane Mitch, not one foreign donor stipulated that accessibility codes be applied when this would have required little to no additional cost. As a result, whole towns, including schools, were rebuilt with barriers for the disabled people who most needed access. Given the high level of national poverty in Honduras, retrofitting is not a likely option. This situation should not be allowed to recur in other countries. Therefore, championing design features that expand access beyond ``average'' or ``typical'' users helps assure that the disabled, poor people are able to come and go from their homes, cross streets, or go to schools and enter the labour force and avail themselves of public services such as education and health. Encouraging appropriate design standards is an essential element in reducing, and eventually eliminating, poverty in the developing countries.

In addition, we need more accurate data and research, better communications so that the disabled know what help is on offer to get work or an education. While it is certainly true that the international community has done little to include disability in its development work, there are some key opportunities from which to launch a more sustained action on disability. Addressing disability is a significant part of reducing poverty; it is not a new area for action. Bringing the disabled out of the corners and the back alleys of society, and empowering them to thrive in the bustling centre of national life will do much to improve the lives of many of the poorest of the poor across the world. It will certainly enrich society as a whole.

(The author is President of the World Bank and former chairman of the Board for the International Federation of Multiple Sclerosis Societies).

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