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United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) adopts a twin-track approach to ensure the full inclusion of Palestine refugees with disabilities. This entails ‘disability mainstreaming’, whereby all UNRWA programmes and services are universally designed to ensure that they are usable by and/or reach beneficiaries with disabilities, coupled with the provision of ‘targeted/tailored interventions’. During 2019, UNRWA implemented the following activities to address the specific needs of Palestine refugees with disabilities:

• Direct Specialized Services for Persons with Disabilities
• Disability Inclusion through Programmes
• International Cooperation

The objective of this study is to generate empirical evidence on the barriers to accessing aid for women and men, girls and boys with disabilities in a post-Cyclone Idai context. By doing so, it also seeks to contribute to policy development for an inclusive humanitarian response in Mozambique

The research followed a qualitative design, using interviews and focus group discussions followed by inductive analysis to reveal dominant themes and stories. Data was collected in 30 in-depth interviews with women and men, girls and boys with disabilities and/or caregivers in communities (Beira), as well as in resettlement sites (Dondo).

Purpose: To find modifiable factors that are related to subjective well-being would be valuable for improving interventions in fibromyalgia. Physical activity, sedentary behaviour, and physical fitness may represent potential areas to optimize treatment regimens. In fibromyalgia, there is a discordance between clinical observations and patient-reported outcomes (objective and subjective assessments). Therefore, the present study aims at analyzing the associations of objective and subjective evaluations of physical activity, sedentary behaviour, and physical fitness with subjective well-being and determine if and how objective and subjective associations differ.

Methods: In this population-based cross-sectional study participated 375 women with fibromyalgia from the al-Ándalus project (Spain). Physical activity, sedentary behaviour, and physical fitness were objectively (accelerometers and performance testing) and subjectively (questionnaires) measured. Participants self-reported their levels of positive affect, negative affect, and life satisfaction.

Results: In the most conservative multivariate analysis, we found independent associations of the objective measures of physical activity with positive affect and life satisfaction and sedentary behaviour with positive affect. No such relationship was seen with subjective measures of the same behaviours. Moreover, we observed that objective and subjective physical fitness evaluations were independent of each other related to subjective well-being.

Conclusions: Independent associations of the objective measures (but not the subjective assessments) of physical activity with positive affect and life satisfaction, and of sedentary behaviour with positive affect were observed. However, objective measures and subjective appraisals of physical fitness appear to be independently related to well-being, which should be considered when developing physical exercise interventions for fibromyalgia.

A summary overview of the findings of a study led by LIGHT FOR THE WORLD with its partners, supported by the Early Childhood Program of the Open Society Foundations. The aim of the study was to uncover the trends in aid for inclusive Early Child Development (ECD) for 2017. It further identified strategic commitments to ECD, as reflected in policy documents up until 2019. The research examined donors’ spending and commitments in three key areas: early childhood development; inclusive early education and pre-primary; and disability-inclusive early childhood development investments in the sectors of health, nutrition, education and sanitation.

This study presents a baseline on donor investment in ECD services in low- and middle-income countries for the children who are traditionally left behind. It draws lessons from six bilateral donor countries – Belgium, Canada, France, Germany, the United Kingdom (UK) and the United States (US) – as well as the Global Partnership for Education (GPE), European Union (EU) Institutions, the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) and the World Bank. Donor advocacy briefs for each of these donors are provided.

The study focuses on donor contributions to scaling up ECD services in four African countries: Burkina Faso, Mozambique, Zambia and Zimbabwe

Background: Community-based rehabilitation (CBR) is a complex concept and strategy that has been implemented in diverse ways globally and in South Africa. Internationally, some stakeholders have described CBR as confusing, and this may influence implementation. A southern African study reports that there is insufficient evidence of the understanding of CBR in the region to influence training, policy and practice.

Objectives: The aim of this study was to investigate South African stakeholders’ knowledge of CBR.

Method: This article reports on an electronic survey that was part of a larger mixed methods study. Based on the sample of 86 respondents, descriptive statistics were used to analyse the quantitative data and thematic analysis for the qualitative data.

Results: The majority of respondents had had exposure to CBR, but almost a quarter had no knowledge of the CBR guidelines and matrix. The results revealed varying knowledge concerning the key concepts of CBR, its beneficiaries and its funders. Respondents identified persons with disabilities as having a central role in the implementation of CBR. Problems with the visibility of CBR programmes were noted, as well as misunderstandings by many therapists.

Conclusion: The implementation of CBR, and its goal of ensuring the rights of persons with disabilities, is negatively affected by the confusion attached to the understanding of what CBR is. The misunderstandings about, and lack of visibility of, CBR in South Africa may hinder its growing implementation in the country in line with new government policies.

African Journal of Disability, Vol 8, 2019

This rapid labour market assessment was undertaken in the intervention areas of Dhaka, Gazipur, Tangail, Chattogram and Khulna. The objectives were to analyse current scenario of the labour market, identify job opportunities for persons with disabilities, skills requirement for those jobs, risks and barriers of getting those jobs, etc. This report explains the facts and findings of the assessment and provides recommendations to make Inclusion Works more effective in their interventions. The assessment consists of two parts – secondary literature review and qualitative study.

The opinions expressed are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views or policies of the UK government or members of the Inclusion Works consortium.

This labour market assessment (LMA) has been conducted to collect a baseline to inform the implementation of the Inclusion works project.  The LMA evaluated the economic trends and patterns and identified growth sectors and subsectors with a high propensity for job creation. Using value chain analysis, the LMA identified the kind of jobs available in the selected subsectors and the type of skills and educational qualifications required to fill them. The study also analysed the flows and stocks of education that the workforce possess to match the demand in the selected subsectors. Furthermore, the LMA assessed functionality of labour market coordination system and how existing policies and structures influence the labour market.

The opinions expressed are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views or policies of the UK government or members of the Inclusion Works consortium.

Legal capacity of persons with mental disabilities was a con- tentious issue during the process of drafting the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. The Arab Group, consisting of Muslim-majority countries, in the United Nations expressed reservations about the formulation of the Article related to this issue. However, their reservations were dis- missed because they arguably had to do with language-specificity. The author revisits these deliberations and argues that the reservations of the Arab countries have to do with reli- gious aspects rooted in the Islamic tradition. By ignoring these religious aspects, the Disability Convention missed a rich source of wisdom provided by a world religion like Islam. On the other hand, the innovative insights provided by the Disability Convention can be of value to improve contemporary discussions on legal capacity within the Islamic tradition. Unlike the previous studies, which either focused on the approach of the Disability Convention or that of the Islamic tradition, this study examines both approaches and highlights the points of agree- ment and disagreement and finally proposes suggestions for narrowing the existing gap between these two approaches.

This labour market assessment (LMA) was important to ensure the Inclusion Works programme interventions are strategic and provide the most optimal way to address unemployment challenges facing persons with disabilities. This LMA was designed to answer key questions associated with perspectives on: policy; coordination systems; employer; training and recruitment service providers; and job seekers. To address the questions, the assessment attempted to identify; the growing sectors and job opportunities in Lagos, Abuja and Jigawa States, the demand and supply of skills for enabling persons with disabilities to compete for current and future job opportunities, and understanding barriers for employers and persons with disabilities with regards to disability inclusive formal employment while focusing on both current and future opportunities in formal and informal sectors.

The opinions expressed are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views or policies of the UK government or members of the Inclusion Works consortium.