This special day is an opportunity to acknowledge the effort and struggle of people living in poverty, a chance for them to make their concerns heard, and a moment to recognise that poor people are the first ones to fight against poverty.
“One fifth of the world’s poorest people have some form of disability and 80% live in developing countries.” Says Kirsty Smith CBMUK, CEO based in Cambridge.
Not only do persons with disabilities experience disproportionately high rates of poverty, but being poor increases the likelihood of disability. Those living in chronic poverty often have limited access to land, healthcare, clean water, nutritious food, shelter, education and employment. Furthermore, people in chronic poverty often live and work in hazardous conditions, and are frequently the focus of discrimination, violence and exploitation. All these factors can cause disability.
Kirsty Smith continues: “People affected by disability are more likely to experience poverty; and being poor increases the chance of having a disability. CBM aims to break this cycle by both empowerment of individuals, families and organisations and by breaking down barriers in society.”
It is not the impairment per se creating poverty and dependency, but the exclusion of persons with disabilities from mainstream social, economic and political opportunities. Persons with disabilities require often more human and financial resources from their families for support, such as daily needs and activities, mobility, communication, medicines, transport, or technical devices. Besides the direct cost related to their impairment, persons with disabilities are often being unabled by society to go to school, to contribute to the livelihood of the family or to get married. This increases poverty and the risk of disease and impairment within the families.
Disability is not just an issue of an ”unfortunate” group of people, and rehabilitation cannot be achieved only by providing enabling services. All people have experiences of ability and of disability, of discrimination and injustice. Mainstream attitudes, norms and standards, denial of human rights, environmental and economic situations, all are in constant interaction and change and contribute greatly to the impact of the individual impairment.
CBM UK, the overseas disability charity based in Cambridge adheres to the ”twin-track approach”, meaning both mainstreaming of disability into all strategic areas of development practice as well as supporting specific disability initiatives for empowerment of persons with disabilities. By doing so, CBM aims to maximise its direct and indirect contribution to achieving global development goals and reducing extreme poverty. CBM prioritises alliances, partnerships and services that have the greatest impact on alleviating poverty, taking into account specific local factors.
CBM also contributes to alliances that create awareness and tackle global causes of poverty and disability, such as systematic human rights offences and unfair trading policies.
“CBM advocates the importance of promoting and including people with disability in all aspects of life, while trying to break the barriers that hinder their participation. This is even more true in poor countries where fewer resources and negative cultural attitudes towards persons with disabilities contribute to exclude them from education, health care programmes and information, employment, political life and cultural activities. Any effort to reduce and eliminate poverty can only be effective if it takes into account people with disabilities.” Says Kirsty Smith, CBMUKCEO.