The G20 continues this year with Brazil taking the presidency. The C20, an engagement group under G20, is being coordinated by Abong – Brazilian Association of NGOs. The role of C20 is to provide civil society insight and recommendations to hold governments accountable for their commitments. Civil society representatives push for effective financial implementation and allocation of resources to achieve positive outcomes for society as a whole.
The C20 Brazil’s Midterm Meeting took place on July 1st & 2nd in Rio de Janeiro Brazil, where the global civil society’s political coordination efforts to influence G20 was seen.
Founder & Executive Director, Nidhi Goyal joined a panel on “Fair, Inclusive and Anti-Racist Economies: Why and for whom?” on 1st July at 7.30 PM IST, remotely to speak about disability inclusion in economies. Persons with disabilities on average as a group are more likely to experience adverse socioeconomic outcomes than non-disabled people which leads to a high unemployment rate. Keeping the principle of “leave no one behind” inclusive economies open up approximately 7% of GDP globally. She spoke about how the mainstreaming of disability has high returns on investments citing the example of universal access which benefits the elderly and pregnant women as well as people with disability.
She further suggested the below recommendations for making inclusive economies a reality:
- Aggregation and dispersion of disability data across ministries
- Framing of Laws and repealing some to ensure non-discrimination
- Focus on education, skilling and employment with the building of necessary infrastructure
- health access & equity with a focus on universal health coverage including community-based rehabilitation and health support
- Accessible & inclusive infrastructure – with an ask for every country in the G20 to commit to making 100 cities and towns equipped with physical and digital infrastructure which will foster a full and independent life for people with disabilities
- and to make all this possible – budgetary commitment.
Link to the full Youtube event is here.