By IDA

 - January 29, 2022

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 UN (Blue), Disability Movement (Purple, building on the Wethe15 Campaign colours), NGO/broader Humanitarian Civil society actors (Red), and the principles of Coordination, Integration, Inclusion and Diversity of identities and backgrounds of members. On the right hand side: The acronym "drg" in small letters (less aggressive and more stylish than capital letters) refers to the most commonly used name of the group (Disability Reference Group) with the full official name of the group underneath it: Reference Group on Inclusion of Persons with Disabilities in Humanitarian Action.

Monthly Newsletter | Issue 17 - January 2022

A young boy with crutches sitting with a blind old man

Reference Group on Inclusion of Persons with Disabilities in Humanitarian Action

Dear DRG members,

Welcome to the 17th edition of the DRG Newsletter!

2022 has started off with a busy period of preparations for the next Global Disability Summit. The Disability Reference Group and its members are working hard to ensure that the processes and outcomes of the Summit are inclusive of those who are among the furthest left behind. To ensure the rights of persons with disabilities who are impacted by humanitarian emergencies, commitments are needed by development and humanitarian actors to build truly inclusive service systems and communities and to partner with persons with disabilities in achieving this.
 
We look forward to continuing to work with all DRG members in 2022 to further build on the gains we made last year and to continue the great momentum with which we have started this year. As always, we hope you find this useful, and encourage you to share with us any updates you would like to see included in our next newsletter!

Elham Youssefian (International Disability Alliance), Christian Modino Hok (CBM Global) and Kirstin Lange (UNICEF)

© UNICEF

Leaving No One Behind in Humanitarian Action - UN Today

UN Today, the official magazine of international civil servants, has published an article providing an overview of the work of UN and partners in making humanitarian action more inclusive. The article highlights that persons with disabilities are particularly at risk in humanitarian crises, which have escalated in 2022, propelled by conflict, climate change and the COVID-19 pandemic. The article refers to the Disability Reference Group as a key mechanism for driving forward disability inclusive humanitarian action through partnership between UN entities, NGOs and OPDs.

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SAFE Zimbabwe Technical Assistance Facility research report: Use of technology to facilitate GBV survivors’ access to justice - SDDirect

Digital technologies are increasingly being used to facilitate access to justice, a process which presents benefits, opportunities and risks to gender-based violence (GBV) survivors’ specifically. This report demonstrates how online protection orders, virtual court hearings, legal support to survivors, and more, can be digital solutions (or barriers) for GBV survivors, drawing from a range of best practice examples from around the world.
 

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Disability Inclusion Helpdesk: Evidence Digest on Health and Disability - SDDirect

The COVID-19 pandemic drew attention to how people with disabilities are being excluded from health systems globally. This evidence from the FCDO/Inclusive Futures Helpdesk digest synthesises the latest research, evidence, and guidance on disability inclusion in health systems, including the barriers and discrimination people with disabilities face when accessing health systems and learning on more inclusive programming.

>> Link to the Evidence Digest

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How Getting Organized has Helped Mitigate the Impact of COVID-19 on People with Disabilities - Oxfam From Poverty to Power

 
In this blog post, Jessie Meaney-Davis highlights the findings from the Disability Inclusion Helpdesk's recent research on experiences of Organisations of People with Disabilities during the pandemic. During the pandemic, people with disabilities and OPDs were largely excluded from emergency planning and response mechanisms. Instead of being invited to work with governments and humanitarian actors in emergency response planning, they found themselves trying to mitigate the damage caused by policy decisions that had not adequately considered and included people with disabilities. This had several impacts, including on mental health services, education and advocacy work.
 

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Intersectionality Resource Guide & Toolkit - UNPRPD/UNWomen

This Resource Guide and Toolkit is the result of a collaborative effort between UN Women, UNPRPD, Members of Civil Society Advisory Group including the International Disability Alliance and its Community of Practice members, and inter-Agency joint project partners.

It has been developed to help both organizations and individual practitioners and experts to address intersectionality in policies and in programmes. It may be used by individuals or teams to assess their own knowledge, attitudes and practice, at a programme level as a supplement to existing design, adaptation and assessment processes or at policy level to better understand and address the different and intersecting effects of policy on marginalised persons.

>> Link to the Resource Guide and Toolkit

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Youth with Disabilities in the Humanitarian Development Nexus Doctoral Research
Sherin Alshaikhahmed is conducting doctoral research on “The Role of Youth with Disabilities in the Humanitarian Development Nexus” with Oxford Brookes University. Her study seeks to examine and investigate the participation of youth with disabilities in the humanitarian-development nexus at global and national levels in Jordan and Somalia. During the MPhil stage, she is planning to conduct remote interviews via zoom with representatives of 10-15 Humanitarian and Development Organisations at the global level who have engaged in disability and/or youth inclusion.
Information collected will be used to map out global inclusive humanitarian and development initiatives for youth with disabilities. This will enable us to gain a better understanding of the barriers faced by people with disabilities during the implementation of those initiatives.
 
If you are working at a global level with a humanitarian or development organisation and interested in participating in this research, please reach out to:

Sherin Alshaikhahmed
MPhil/PhD Candidate, Oxford Brookes University, UK
Centre for Development & Emergency Practice
Email: 119147785 [at] brookes.ac.uk

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Call for Action on Commitments to Disability Inclusive Humanitarian Action at the Global Disability Summit

The second Global Disability Summit will be held on February 2022, hosted by the International Disability Alliance (IDA) and the Governments of Norway and Ghana. In the lead-up to this important event, we call on governments, multilateral agencies and civil society to ensure that over 41 million children and adults with disabilities in humanitarian settings are not left behind as commitments are made to promote the rights of persons with disabilities worldwide.

This call to action provides an overview of concrete commitments that all partners can make, to further progress towards ensuring the rights of persons with disabilities in humanitarian emergencies.

>> Link to the Call to Action

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2021 Regional Humanitarian Partnership Week - Building a more Inclusive Humanitarian Ecosystem (Virtual) [Jan 31st - Feb 4th]

Co-hosted by ADRRN, Community World Service Asia, ICVA and OCHA, the 2021 Regional Humanitarian Partnership Week will bring in a diverse audience from across the region to take these conversations further through inclusive and interactive sessions.

Expected outcomes of the event

  1. Showcase diverse views, understanding and analysis from different stakeholders in the Asia-Pacific region based on their own contexts and expertise.
  2. Catalyse plan for actions and commitments to advance the various priority areas and inform regional actions moving forward.
  3. Exchange information on resources, events, or initiatives that other stakeholders may be interested to join or support in 2022.

Sessions
Day 1 (31 January 2022) - An Inclusive Humanitarian Ecosystem
Day 2 (1 February 2022) - Linking Humanitarian Action, DRR and Resilience Work in the context of the climate crisis
Day 3 (2 February 2022) - Humanitarian Financing- Thinking outside the box
Day 4 (3 February 2022) - Protection in the Asia Pacific
Day 5 (4 February 2022) - Understanding Risk

>> Link to the Registration Form

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Webinar: Disability Inclusive Disaster Risk Reduction – Still a Tick Marking Exercise? [Feb 14th]

This webinar is organized by the United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction and Ministry for Foreign Affairs of Finland. Persons with disabilities' mortality rate can be two to four times higher than the rest of society when facing a disaster situation. They are disproportionately impacted by the disasters. They are the most at risk in crisis-affected communities.
When it comes to the disability-inclusive disaster risk reduction policies, are countries succeeding in their development and implementation? Or is it still a tick marking exercise?

Join the UNDRR and MFA Finland for the discussion with the top experts in disability inclusion and community on 14 February 2022 from 13:00-14:00 CET International Sign Interpretation and real-time captioning will be provided.

>> Link to Register
>> Link to the Event Page

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Global Disability Summit - Side Events on Humanitarian Action [Feb 16th - 17th]

A lot of side events will take place under the auspices of the Global Disability Summit 2022, some of which related to Humanitarian Action. One of the side events include that organized by the Disability Reference Group: ‘Looking forward to a strengthened promotion of the rights of persons with disabilities affected by humanitarian emergencies’ to be held on 16 February at 7am EST/ 1pm CET.
A list of side events happening on February 16th and 17th is already available on the GDS Portal. Make sure to check the website regularly as more information and side events will be updated on the pages !

>> Link to the Side Events Pages

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Save the Date - Microsoft Ability Summit [May 10th]

Ability Summit is a free, community event that brings together people with disabilities, allies, and industry professionals to ImagineBuild, and Include the future of disability inclusion and accessibility. Microsoft is thrilled to be hosting their 12th annual Ability Summit, and welcome all to join and spread the word throughout their internal and external communities!
Registration will open in early March.

>> Link to the Event Page
>> Link to Recordings of Last Year's Summit

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Please share any feedback you may have on the content and format of this Newsletter with us. You can send any material you want to be included in the next issues of the Newsletter by the last Monday of the month via email: rg.disabilityinclusion [at] gmail.com rg.disabilityinclusion [at] gmail.com ()