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Making Finance Work for Inclusive Development, 17 October 2012

Speakers at the European Development Day’s panel on Making Finance Work for Inclusive Development.
Photo courtesy of the European Union.

The IDDC organized a joint high level panel during the European Development Days focused on inclusive microfinance. In addition to IDDC, the panel was sponsored by the European Microfinance Platform, United Nations Capital Development Fund (UNCDF), and the International Finance Corporation (IFC) from the World Bank group. Panelists included Imoni Akpofure, Director, Western Europe, IFC; Flavia Bwire, Program Coordinator Micro Finance and Disability Program, Association of Microfinance Institutions of Uganda; Henri Dommel, Director, Financial Inclusion Division, UNCDF; Charlotte McClain-Nhlapo, Coordinator, Office for Disability and Inclusive Development, United States Agency of International Development (USAID); Klaus Rudischhauser, Deputy Director General, Directorate General for Development and Cooperation – EuropeAid, European Commission; Roberto Vellutini, Vice President for Countries, Inter-American Development Bank; and was moderated by Chris Burns, Euronews.

The panel was very important for IDDC since it effectively promoted putting disability rights on the development agenda. Today, about 2.7 billion people and 400 million businesses around the world lack basic access to financial services, impeding the development of individuals, businesses, and economies. Access to financial services provides stability and accelerates equitable development and growth for households and businesses. This is especially true for vulnerable and excluded groups, such as persons with disabilities — over 1 billion people worldwide. Consequently, making financial and microfinance programs inclusive of everyone has great social and economic impact. This gap in inclusion is a global challenge, but also an opportunity. New business models are making it possible to provide financial services to those once thought unreachable, thus tackling pervasive development challenges.

The High Level Panel showcased how finance can work for inclusive development, and highlighted innovative approaches to tackle the needs of specific vulnerable groups and sectors of society in developing countries. Panelists made specific policy recommendations on what further actions are needed to close the financial inclusion gap. Some key points were addressed by the panelists during the discussion.

Microfinance has encouraged entrepreneurs and could be used to enable many marginalised persons with disabilities to become entrepreneurs, thereby offering these one billion individuals access new sources of finance.

Innovation using new-technology (such as smart cards) could also greatly improve the outreach of financial services, but one must acknowledge that these are not the only possible solutions, as they must be accessible for all people with disabilities, such as visually impaired individuals.

It is necessary to convince the private sector that working with small businesses, including those run by persons with disabilities, is a win-win situation for everyone, and provides them with access to a whole new range of clients.

The government plays an important role in creating a regulatory environment and creating stability that allows small business to thrive. Additionally, the EU’s Agenda for Change is a sign of the change of direction in development aid as it has a focus on using the private sector to help sustainable development occur.

There are over one billion people worldwide with disabilities. This is a huge untapped market opportunity for providers of financial services, as well as an important arena where the rights of persons with disabilities should be championed. Everyone should have access to financial services, and microfinance contributes significantly to this development. The financial sector makes an important contribution to development challenges. We need a shift in our strategies from our traditional understanding to a more integrated approach that includes the new drivers of financial inclusion, from policy making to distribution channels and retail institutions, in order to achieve financial access for all.

Handicap International Luxembourg "For a better consideration of persons with disabilities in international solidarity actions: which institutional and associative support from the north?"

Handicap International Luxembourg hosted an event titled “For a better consideration of persons with disabilities in international solidarity actions: which institutional and associative support from the North?” on 24 October 2012. The event was a workshop roundtable that was planned in part by our close collaboration with Info-Handicap.

Info-Handicap represents the National Council of Persons with Disabilities in Luxembourg, and the event was held on their premise. Nine NGO’s and eight DPO’s were represented at the event. Mrs. Marie-Josée Jacobs represented the Ministry of Cooperation and provided an update on the implementation of the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities in Luxembourg. Mr Silvio Sagramola, Info-Handicap director, presented a session on “Accessibility for All, as an essential factor for inclusion,” complemented with HI technical advisor Mr Hugues Nouvellet’s presentation of a studycase: “an example of support to the accessibility of schools in Algeria, according to an Inclusive Local Development approach,” with participation of local civil society. Mrs Priscille Geiser, HI technical advisor, presented a session on the various aspects of the support to DPOs advocacy in developing countries. Mr Lelenta, president of the Disabled Lawyers Association of Mali,introduced the situation of persons with disabilities in his country, and the advocacy activities conducted by Malian DPOs.

Participants of the event later split into sub-groupsto collaborate and make recommendations regarding the development of concrete exchanges and increased information sharing between stakeholders of NGO’s and DPO’s from the South and the North. Luxembourg’s Ministry of Cooperation’s strategy regarding the mainstreaming of disability in development policies was shared with the event participants. The minister of Cooperation accepted the idea of a working group on the elaboration of a draft of these guidelines. The working group’s objective is to produce a draft to be presented to the“Assises Luxembourgeoises de la Coopération” in September 2013.

Luxembourg NGOs are aware of the thematic “disability and development” and the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. They are more willing to take into account persons with disabilities in their upcoming projects, and wish to increase their knowledge and level of understanding on the disability issue in general along with the specific difficulties faced by persons with disabilities in developing countries. Luxembourg DPOs are more concerned by the thematic of disability in the South and want to increase their knowledge and level of understanding of the situation and contexts of developing countries, and on the situation of persons with disabilities in these countries. Overall, all organizations involved showed interest in building a working-group and long term contributions, to the design of guidelines and to a policy-paper on disability as part of the strategy and orientations documents of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

IDDC organise roundtable in European Parliament on EU External Action
19th February 2013, European Parliament

© European Union 2013 EP
Legal notice : http://audiovisual.europarl.europa.eu/LegalNotice.asp

On February 19^th 2013, the IDDC as part of the Making Development Inclusive Project hosted a roundtable with Marian Harkin (member of the European Parliament) on the implementation of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities and the role of the EU’s external action. As the EU ratified the CRPD in 2010 and its first monitoring report to the Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities is due this year the roundtable was timely to discuss best practices and ideas on how to move the topic of the rights of persons with disabilities in international cooperation forward.

The speakers were Mr. Shudarson Subedi, President of the National Federation of the Disabled Nepal (NFDN), Mr. Munyaradzi Mahiya, LCD's Young Voices, Zimbabwe, Ms. Silvia Quan, Expert Member of the CRPD committee and Procuraduría de los Derechos Humanos de Guatemala, Ms. Valerie Moran, Manager of Longford Centre for Independent Living Ltd, Ireland and Ms. Mary Keogh, Advocacy Coordinator of CBM Ireland. Each speaker presented models of good practice on inclusive development and human rights for persons with disabilities. The speakers were followed by interventions from representatives from DG Justice and the European External Action Service

Marian Harkin opened the proceedings by stating that each of us has only one life to live and we need to ensure people with disabilities are included and have choices. Both Silvia and Shudarson gave examples of how disability rights are not mainstream issues in Latin America and Nepal and how many basic rights are denied to persons with disabilities. Valerie gave an account of how austerity in Ireland had impacted on the lives of persons and with disabilities to live independently and Mary commented that disability rights are universal and don’t know any boundaries or borders.  There was also a video intervention from Munyaradzi Mahiya from Young Voices in Leonard Cheshire Disability who called for television and radio to sensitize people to disability. The post 2015 agenda was also raised by each speaker and in particular the need for people with disabilities to be involved in the current consultations. Each of the speakers also commented on how the EU through its external action can continue to support the implementation of the CRPD and promote the rights of persons with disabilities