Organisations of persons with disabilities (OPDs) are representative organisations or groups of persons with disabilities, where persons with disabilities constitute a majority of the overall staff, board, and volunteers in all levels of the organisation.

IDDC OPD Partnership Task Group was created to promote the meaningful cross-disability partnerships and networks with OPDs from low and middle-income countries. IDDC believes and supports OPDs to act as a driving force for CRPD compliant sustainable development by joint capacity building and empowerment activities, hence supporting the disability movement message ‘Nothing Without Us’. The TG aims to coordinate IDDC members support to increase OPD participation in human rights and development platforms. The TG also aims to support capacity building amongst its members and across other TGs, ensuring the meaningful participation of persons with disabilities and their representative organisations throughout their work.

Capacity-building of OPDs is therefore central to the OPD Partnership TG activities as demonstrated by the fact that many of its members are directly involved into the BRIDGE CRPD-SDGs training activities held together with the International Disability Alliance.

Key Data

  • 1.3 billion people, or over 16% of the world’s population, have significant disability, and disability prevalence is higher for developing countries.
  • Almost 50% of OPDs are dissatisfied with their involvement by governments (IDA, 1st Global Report, p. 29)
  • Up to 75% of OPDs report being involved by governments, UN and funding agencies on disability specific issues, whereas only 8% of OPDs report such involvement on climate action. (IDA, 1st Global Report, p. 34)
  • 30% of OPDs report a decrease in funding from 2019 to 2022 (IDA, 2nd Global Report, p. 16).

Key achievements

  • More than 140 OPDs’ leaders, staff and activists have been trained with 5 cycles completed through the capacity-building initiative. BRIDGE CRPD-SDG in South East Asia, Latin America, Indonesia, East and West Africa and the Pacific.
  • Deepened the collaboration with IDA around supporting national OPDs contributions for the CoSP and the HLPF financially and technically.
  • Created learning spaces for members to come together and share case studies, lessons learned and recommendations around partnering with OPDs in low- and middle-income countries.
  • Collaborated with IDA to deliver 3 webinars for members about how to engage with the BRIDGE training program.
  • Supported the Global Disability Summit 2022 by supporting IDA in selecting case studies for their OPD discussion paper and drafting commitments submitted by IDDC.

Upcoming priorities

  • Creation of guidelines on meaningful OPD engagement for IDDC members and how to support other IDDC TG members to increase OPD participation in their respective mandates.
  • Actively participate in BRIDGE Steering Committee meetings and provide updates for OPD TG members.
  • Assess and share with members on best practices of IDDC members on OPD engagements.