Improving the Use and Appropriation of ICTs for People with Disabilities in Latin America and the Caribbean

 

More than 50 million people in Latin America and the Caribbean suffer from some type of physical or mental disability.  More than 80% of people with disabilities in Latin America are unemployed and 80% to 90% live in poverty. It is now widely understood that disability and poverty are highly associated factors worldwide: having a disability is strongly linked to greater levels of poverty, whereas living in poverty may increase the chances of having a disability through poor or unsafe living conditions, inadequate medical attention and malnutrition.

 

The United Nations set ambitious goals for greatly reducing or eradicating poverty throughout the world by the year 2015. Due to the staggering numbers of people with disabilities among the poor, it would be nearly impossible to reach these Millennium Development Goals without making significant progress to improve the status of people with disabilities. As the former World Bank president stated:

 

Unless disabled people are brought into the development mainstream, it will be impossible to cut poverty in half by 2015 or to give every girl and boy the chance to achieve a primary education by the same date - goals agreed to by more than 180 world leaders at the United Nations Millennium Summit in September 2000.

                                                                                        - Washington Post, Dec. 3, 2002

 

In response, international development agendas need to focus on building local individual and organizational capacity to address and serve the needs faced by the population. This is essential to increase the social, educational and employment opportunities for people with disabilities in Latin America and the Caribbean.

 

In order to address this need, The Trust for the Americas, a 501(c)(3), not-for-profit corporation, affiliated with the Organization of American States (OAS), is working with the Zoltner Consulting Group  to:

1) Determine and assess the environment affecting people with disabilities in Latin America and the Caribbean, with an emphasis on El Salvador, Peru, Mexico, Chile, Colombia, and the Dominican Republic;

 

2) Improve levels of technology access for people with disabilities, through established community telecenters and telecenter networks;

 

3) Increase the capacity of local organizations to provide better and additional services for people with disabilities in order to promote their fuller inclusion in society; and

 

4) Raise awareness among employers in the private, public and nonprofit sectors about the benefits and opportunities of employing people with disabilities.

 

This initiative leverages the three main complementary strengths of the Trust team: 1) Specialized expertise, experience and capabilities of the Trust’s project management team in executing substantial employment capacity building programs for people with disabilities throughout Latin America; including El Salvador, Peru, Mexico, Colombia and the Dominican Republic; 2) In-kind software donations from the Microsoft Corporation and in-kind contributions from experienced local and international partners; and 3) The visibility of the OAS as a respected international institution by the private, nonprofit and public sectors.

 

With 50,000 telecentre managers participating in networks across the world at present and an expected twenty-fold growth over the next three to four years, it is urgent that a flexible and cost-effective training program be designed in order to ensure that this global investment in human resources not be squandered. To ensure this, it is essential to create a global framework to support and promote open, continuous and collaborative learning, capacity building and curriculum development for telecenter-based staff and volunteers. By doing so, the telecentre.org Academy and its national chapters will become the place for acquiring knowledge and enhancing skills for efficient management of telecentres around the world, thus increasing their sustainability and longevity of the telecentres involved.

The Trust Team

 

The Trust for the Americas

The Organization of American States

Microsoft Corporation

Alliance for Technology Access

Fundación Esplai

telecentre.org

Zoltner Consulting Group

Local and regional partnerships with civil society and government