Disability inclusion and disaster risk reduction at the UN HQ

Source(s): CBM International

On 27 October, the UN in NY held a briefing on The United Nations Third World Conference on Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR). This briefing was co-organized by the Permanent Missions of Finland and Thailand, in collaboration with the United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction (UNISDR).

Vladimir Cuk, Executive Director, The International Disability Alliance (IDA) provided an intervention on behalf of the International Disability and Development Consortium (IDDC) and IDA as members of the Disability Stakeholder Group.

Valérie Scherrer (CBM ERU, Director), Tchaurea Fleury (IDA), and I drafted the statement, which was real teamwork. Thank you both! The core messages of the statement included thanking the Co-Chairs for the strong inclusion of persons with disabilities in The Post-2015 framework for disaster risk reduction zero draft, advocating to keep these references in the final document and providing key recommendations, which are as follows:

- Maintain all references of persons with disabilities, especially disaggregated data by disability status
Maintain references of Universal Design principles and information and communication accessibility
- In the role of stakeholders, ensure that persons with disabilities and their representative organisations are:

o Partners in designing, implementing and monitoring the post-2015 DRR framework
o Contributors to the formulation and monitoring of local, national and regional policies and plans ensuring compliance with the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities
o Experts and resources for mainstream stakeholders to ensure disability-inclusive DRR is implemented throughout communities

As background, the zero draft will be negotiated in Geneva in November and finalised for the World Conference on DRR in Sendai, Japan in March 2015. This document is the culmination of reports from regional platforms and global advocacy and will be a key document for DRR in the future. Moreover, it will feed into the post-2015 development goals and targets, creating a link between the Hyogo Framework for Action and post-2015 development agenda processes.

In regards to persons with disabilities, the zero draft submitted by the Co-Chairs of the Preparatory Committee contains five references to persons with disabilities, a mention of the principles of Universal Design, and the use of “inclusive” and “accessible” throughout the document, including accessible media.

More specifically:

- Persons with disabilities are included in the Preamble (para. 6)
- Disability perspective included into disaster-risk management
- Informed decision-making based on disaggregated data, including by disability status
- Investing in economic, social, cultural, and environmental resilience with the inclusion the Principles of Universal Design
- Strengthen the implementation of social safety-net mechanisms to assist the poor and at-risk groups, such persons with disabilities
- Under Role of stakeholders: “Persons with disabilities are critical in the assessment of risk and design and implementation of plans tailored to specific requirements in line with the Principles of Universal Design.”

The briefing was a positive step for the inclusion of persons with disabilities in the post-2015 framework for DRR, and we must continue to advocate to ensure no one is left behind.

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