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This replication guidebook is a tool that aims to highlight the link between social exclusion and poverty and is based on the premise that a country cannot achieve its development targets, if a section of its people is left behind.

This guidebook aims to show practitioners practical ways of working on economic development that inclusive of socially excluded groups such as women, people with disabilities, people living in poverty, etc. It provides corresponding concepts, explains the steps and suggests tools that may help practitioners use and adapt to their context. The context of this book are based on field level experience of the project team of the Inclusive Economic Development project.

The ASEAN Hometown Improvement Project, aimed to tackle challenges emerging from urbanization and the rise of the ageing population in the ASEAN region by attempting timely and relevant improvements to disability inclusive ‘hometowns’. 

Three approaches were utilized:

1) Promotion of an inclusive business through capacity building of persons with disabilities

2) Promotion of accessibility features in the community and other public places, as well as to information, communication, and transportation

3) Promotion of cooperation with government sector via discussions to find solutions to improve the livelihood of persons with disabilities

The sections, arranged per country in alphabetical order, contain the following: Hometown Improvement Project description and backgrounder; Capacity Building Workshop details; Key Partners and Stakeholders; Training Results; Challenges; Framework for Good Practice; and Way Forward and include:

• Cambodia: Phnom Penh Center for Independent Living's Bakery by Persons with Disabilities
• Indonesia: Batik Design and Marketing Management at Kampung Peduli
• Malaysia: Branding and Marketing Management for Bakery and Handicraft by Persons with Disabilities at CBR Semenyih
• Myanmar: Mushroom Production by Persons with Disabilities with Shwe Minn Tha Foundation
• Phillipines: Sustainable Inclusive Urban Micro-Gardening and Community-Based Cooperative at Barangay 177
• Thailand: Earthworm Casting and Cactus Farming at Farm D
• Vietnam: Fermented Dry Bamboo Waste Fertilizer at Bamboo Dana Co. Ltd

In Indonesia, the Advocacy for Change project aimed to increase the effective participation of people with disabilities in inclusive development efforts at the local level, and promote their participation in development at the national level. Specifically, the Advocacy for Change project sought to improve and monitor the people with disabilities' access to local government processes and existing social services.

Six case studies are presented:

• Community Based Forum as Community Public Space (The culture is the key)
• Building the Foundation of Inclusion with Sendangadi Village Government
• WKCP (Cerebral Palsy Family Association) Health Initiative for Health Budgeting Advocacy
• Citizen Based Forum as a Common Space to Encourage the Government to Build a Disability-Friendly Village in Mata Air Village, Kupang Tengah Sub- district, Kupang District
• Inclusion of Disabled Persons in Noelbaki Village Women's Forum 
• The role of disabled people organization in participation of development with Bappeda Kupang Municipality

A growing number of young people in Sweden with intellectual disability have organized themselves during the last 15 years in self-advocacy groups for socializing, empowerment, and expressing opposition to the norms and attitudes in a society that labels them as disabled. At the same time, the Swedish welfare system has transformed dramatically with processes of far-reaching individualization, closure of the major institutions, decentralization of responsibility from the state to local governments, and an emerging welfare market where service users are turned into customers. The aim of this article is to analyse and discuss the significance of self-advocacy in the new welfare context. Data were collected over a period of more than 10 years using repeated interviews with members of two self-advocacy groups and participation observations. Findings suggest that participation in self-advocacy groups opens up members for increasing health and well-being through new roles and identities, and it strengthens their control over everyday life. Support is still needed, however, but in new ways; otherwise, the restrictions of the institutions will simply be reconstructed in the new welfare system.

Purpose: The Kudumbashree mission, an initiative of the Government of Kerala state in India, has collaborated with Local Self Governments to set up ‘Buds’, a special school system for individuals with intellectual disability. The objectives of this study were to evaluate the structure and functioning of ‘Buds’ schools, to identify the healthcare needs of the students, and to conceptualise a framework for healthcare provision.

Method: A cross-sectional survey was conducted among 202 children at 11 registered ‘Buds’ schools in Kerala. A multidisciplinary team consisting of a psychiatrist, public health personnel and a social worker from the Medical Colleges of Kerala, visited the institutions. Data collection consisted of abstraction from medical records, interviews with parents, and clinical assessment and prescription of intervention by the specialists concerned. A pre-tested semi- structured questionnaire was used for every child. Using both quantitative and qualitative techniques, the public health personnel in the team evaluated the structure and functioning of the schools.

Results: The most commonly associated condition was epilepsy, seen in 11.9% of the children, while 28.2% had behavioural problems. The medicines needed were mainly anti-epileptics and drugs for behavioural problems. Interventions for self help and social skill training were also among the important requirements. The infrastructure and other facilities were poor in many schools, with the average student to teacher ratio at 14:1. While these institutions were well utilised, functioning was good only in 27.2% of the schools. Healthcare services and visits by healthcare personnel were far from adequate. This study proposes a framework in which the Medical Colleges and Health Services can function together to deliver healthcare services to children at these schools, with linkages from the District Mental Health Programme (DMHP).

Conclusion and Recommendation: Evidence that these schools are well utilised indicates a need to propagate this initiative in other areas of the state, country and other countries. However, improvements in infrastructure, human resources and other logistics are required. Besides, the healthcare needs of these children have to be addressed. A comprehensive healthcare programme through the existing system, using a multidisciplinary approach, needs to be developed.

During the “African Decade of Persons with Disabilities (2000-2009)”, East African countries witnessed significant achievements, especially in the development of law, collection of statistics and in funding. However, many persons with disability are still marginalised from opportunities in education, healthcare and employment.

Purpose: With the pre-supposition that the lack of institutional capacities for implementing disability policies is the one major stumbling-block which hinders widespread delivery of social services to persons with disabilities in low-income countries, this study makes a comparative analysis of institutional capacities in the disability sectors of Uganda, Kenya and Tanzania.

Method: The research methods adopted were a literature survey and a field survey. The framework for analysis consists of: 1) capacities and functions of disability units in central governments, 2) relationships between central and local governments in the disability sector, and 3) relationships between governments and organisations of persons with disability (DPOs). Special attention is paid to the status, roles and functions of national councils for disability (NCDs), the independent statutory bodies recently established in each of the three countries, with clear authority and duties for the implementation of disability policies. The NCDs enable multi-sectoral stakeholders to be involved in the implementation of disability policies; therefore, positive relationships between the governments and DPOs are essential for the smooth functioning of the NCDs.

Results: While the result of the field survey in Tanzania reveals several effective approaches for the smooth operation of the NCD, further study is needed to verify whether these approaches would be applicable to other East African countries such as Kenya and Uganda.

The Leprosy Mission Nigeria conducted a disability survey in Kogi and Niger States of Nigeria in 2005, investigating the demographic characteristics of people with disabilities, including gender, age, religion, marital, educational, occupational, employment and economic status, understanding of disability and health-seeking behaviour.

Information was gathered from a convenience sample of participants, across 30 randomly selected towns and villages in the two states. Twelve trained bilingual research assistants were used, to translate the English language questionnaire verbally into the local language of each participant.

From the 1093 respondents studied, the most common disabilities involved vision (37%), mobility (32%) or hearing (15%). A third of these were less than 21 years of age and had no occupation, and 72% were Muslim. Over half of them had no education, 20% had primary, 8% secondary, 2% tertiary and 18% had Islamic education. Common occupations were begging (16%), studying (14%), farming (11%) and trading (8%). The majority were unemployed (61%) due to their disability. Over 70% were not able to access disability specific health services and 37% had an assistive device. Services accessed included health - mainstream (90%), traditional (61%) and counselling (58%); and other - rehabilitation (30%), assistive device provision (24%), welfare (22%), special education (15%), vocational training (10%) and economic empowerment (4%).

These results are comparable with findings in other studies. Disability affects a person’s ability to participate in education, work, family life and religion, influences health-seeking behaviour and contributes to poverty.

This is a presentation on the report of the Rights in Action initiative. The primary objective of this Making It Work initiative is to promote practical, evidence-based recommendations on how to achieve inclusive local governance in West Africa, based on collected examples of good practice in line with Article 29 of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, so that people with disabilities have an active role in shaping the local policies and services that impact directly on their lives. The presentation outlines the objectives of the initiative, the approach used and advocacy activities

This report identifies barriers that children and families face in accessing anti-retroviral therapy (ART) centres in rural India. The report also seeks to find solutions to these barriers based on an operations research conducted in Maharashtra Pradesh and Manipur. Operations research objectives: * To build an understanding among policy makers of the barriers faced by children and caregivers accessing ART services in rural communities. * To assess and highlight a basic minimum level of standards for ART centres in terms of adequacy, quality and timeliness of support needed. * To explore opportunities for linkages with state and district level departments and/or local self-governing institutions