ROUGHLY EDITED COPY

VIVID-VIVID T Closing Conference - Best Practices & Learnings: Session 2-(StreamText)
Job ID: 963947 
Viatores Christi for VIVID

DECEMBER 1, 2021

CART CAPTIONING PROVIDED BY:
AI MEDIA/ALTERNATIVE COMMUNICATION SERVICES, LLC

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This is being provided in a rough-draft format. Communication Access Realtime Translation (CART) is provided in order to facilitate communication accessibility and may not be a totally verbatim record of the proceedings. 

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>> COLETTE:  Can you let people know that we're recording?  I need to start that.
>> RACHEL:  Absolutely.  Just a warning to anybody joining now, we will be recording the session.  We will record every session.  And I will try to remember to warn people before we kickoff.  (Recording in progress) so your warning should be coming up to give consent.  Just press you got it and proceed.  We recommend that you keep your cameras turned off, unless you're actively participating or asking a question.
And so this session is session number 2.  It's a Roundtable discussion on the importance of leadership engagement with disability inclusion.  So next slide, please, Hazel.  We lost Hazel?  There we are.
So just to let you know, again, about real-time captioning in English will be a link in the chat box.  And we have excellent international sign language interpreters as well who will always be on-screen.  Useful links, relevant links will be in the chat box as well.  If you have technical difficulties, please contact Hazel directly.  You can select Hazel and ask her a direct question.  For any content questions or questions about the actual content that's being presented, please put those questions in the chat box, and they will be gathered up and used at the end of the session for question-and-answer session.  So don't hesitate to ask questions.
Please try to keep yourselves muted.  That's most important.  Keep yourself muted and ideally videos turned off unless you're participating.  You can use the gallery function and you can see all the different speakers.  And accessible recording of the conference will be available after the event and we remind you to Tweet if you have a Twitter account.  That would be great.
Here we are in session number 2.  This is led by our own Shane Halpin, CEO of Viatores Christi.  And we'll have panelist from CBM global and Abilis Foundation.  I'm going to turn it over to Shane to introduce himself and everybody else.  Thanks, Shane.
>> SHANE HALPIN:  I'm Shane Halpin.  I'm the (video is captioned).
>> Rachel Ryan, project officer with VC.
Organisation.
>> For more information or to get involved, visit www.cvvolunteers.ie/disability.
>> SHANE HALPIN:  Good morning and afternoon to everyone.  You're most welcome to our leadership event which is organized by critique on behalf of the VIVID-T organization.  As the video explained, my name is Shane Halpin and I'm the CEO of Viatores Christi.  An international developing organisation based in Dublin Ireland.  Today we hope to explore how we can awaken a leadership response to the challenge of disability for the work and programs.  We will have a panel discussion along with input from a range of experts.
>> Can I interrupt there?  Can I ask everyone to mute themselves?  There's somebody whose mic is left on.  Thank you.
>> SHANE HALPIN:  Thanks, Colette.  Sorry.  Today we hope to explore how we can awaken a leadership response to the challenge of disability inclusion in our work and in our programs.  We are going to have a panel discussion along with input from a range of experts.  So if you have any questions, please feel free to use the chat box.
I'm very pleased to be joined today by Catherine Naughton director of EDF partnering with the consortium who will introduce the VIVID-T project and goal and objective.  Catherine is the director, as I've said of the EDF.  Unique platform which brings together and representative organisations of persons with disabilities from across Europe.  She is also the Vice President of the social platform.  Social platform is the largest network of European rights and value based civil society organisations working in the social sector.
Catherine has an academic background in public health and 25 years of experience in the field of disability with the particular focus on the inclusion development.  The rights of persons with disabilities in low and middle-income countries.  So Catherine, over to you.
>> CATHERINE NAUGHTON:  Thank you very much, Shane.  And it's very nice to be with you all here today.  So, basically, the purpose of the project and right at the beginning, we were informed, and we had the project leader reach out to us to look at inclusion of humanitarian volunteering.  And is this is new for the European disability forum.  And so like for me, one of the most important developments during this period of time, what the project achieved was that we have this partnership between mainstream humanitarian and volunteering organisations, and organisations of people with disabilities.  So this was a rich process and development of the project.  And it identified right from the beginning for us this is something unique for the European disability forum.  Our own learning needs were taken into consideration.  So the capacity building of the project was based on what the different partners said they needed to learn.
And so that meant that any training which took place during the project was really relevant for all of us.  And there was also the original project was aimed to have a lot of exchange and learning together, but, in fact, with COVID-19, a lot of that had to be redirected to go online.  And I think the project managed to do that really effectively and adapt quite a bit as we went along.
So one reflection for the European disability forum are in this humanitarian inclusion volunteering was the disability inclusion component.  And we realized that we needed to give more support to the other organisations on inclusion and accessibility.
So we were able to redirect the activities overtime and higher accessibility trainer that we took into future projects.  We would make sure we provided for that capacity right upfront.  This was a learning for us.
So, I think what the kind of things that was achieved during the project was that we all built our capacity on range of issues that was tailored to us in accessibility and security.  And we received training in those areas.  And the European disability forum opened their eyes to the frontier of volunteering and we'll continue that and also to the area of independent living and deinstitutionization and corporation.  And that has opened up during the project and we'll continue that.
And in terms of the way that we were suppose to work, the model of the project was to have a Steering Committee.  Everything went online.  And I have to say the management, the project management and partnership went very, very well and was efficiently organized.  So this we really appreciated.
And in that sense, I think that from our point of view, each though the project activities had to change, for us, what we expected to get from the project, and what we hope to get from the project really exceeded.  And so we really look forward to continuing to work in this field with partners.  Shane mentioned that EDF is an umbrella organisation.
And so that means in all of your countries, we also have members.  And Shane mentioned in his video as well that you can join together with networks at country level.  And this is the best way that we work together in this activity.
One last reflection is that we see as during some of the trainings we had exposure to, that we can see volunteering as a way of career development for people with disabilities.  Whereas before, we thought of it more as social contribution, social participation.  But we worked out from working with the volunteer organisations what an important knock on effect these opportunities can have.  So thank you very much, Shane, for the great cooperation over this period of time.  And I'm looking forward to listening to other people's reflection on the project as well.
>> SHANE HALPIN:  Great.  Thank you very much, Catherine, for the insight and experience you had.  And I'll take this opportunity to thank EDF for all the resources and all the experience they have given to us as an organisation who is really just setting out on this journey.  And EDF has been really helpful to us.
So without further ado, I would like to introduce our guest speaker today.  Birendra Pokharel, who is the Abilis country coordinator in Nepal.  And he's going to give us some context to our topic this morning on awakening a leadership response.  Birendra is a rights activist with a visual impairment living in Nepal.  And he was engaged in the establishment of Asia-Pacific framework of make the rights real.  He participated in the creating new future for all research symposium in Sydney University.  And he has been engaged as a local expert of Abilis Foundation in Finland since 2011.  And facilitates the Abilis grantmaking mechanism.
His role has been recognized for pushing the ratification of CRPD.  That's the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.  So Birendra, if I can hand it over to you for your words of wisdom this morning.
>> MR. BIRENDRA POKHAREL:  Thank you, Shane.  This is, indeed, my great privilege and honor to present my experiences and the views how persons with disabilities and the representatives that are important in different aspects of the development.  As you mentioned, the role of people with disabilities and their represented organisation is very much important for the policy change.  One example I learned from the European disability forum, the practice of disability forum in one literature, I learned that it was a disability parliamentary caucus that was form.  And when the ratification of CRPD was delayed in Nepal, then I just remember that initiatives and pushed the parliamentary into intern parliamentary disability, and finally it was 2009 when the interparliamentary disability caucus unanimously supported for the ratification of the CRPD.  So that was a great initiative.  How the leadership and people with disability can play vital roles for the policy change.  Of course, at that time, I was leading the Nepal disability movement as President of the national Federation.  And it was an organisation.  And we are also the member of the DPI.  Disability people international.
I learned from DPI that we had to raise our voice.  "Nothing About Us Without Us."  And we have to raise our voice.  In the policy level a voice of our own.  This is important not for the organisation for people of disabilities and the leaders but for all.
And during the time, when Nepal was making the constitution, and this year, this stands also, we pushed parliamentarians.  And we have the grassroots organisation.  When the parliamentarian went to the grassroots level and opening of the people, at that time, I lead and suggested with a memorandum.  And so everybody was surprised we have so many leaders from people with disabilities.  So we have to put that important aspect.  Finally, in our constitution now, there are 11 points that discovered for people with disability.  The important aspect is the representatives for people with disability in the parliament, from the representation modality.  So this is what the leaders can do.
Bring change.  And here, the leaders play a vital role if they can build up their capacity.  The loving and continuous updating of international scenario, the human rights instrument, it is very, very important.  So the knowledge, expert and knowledge of enhancement is very important aspect.  So in the interest of what is going and how the human rights instruments are being implemented, and in the United Nations level also, the Universal periodical review is from the country level and what is being viewed, in the UPR and CRPD community is reviewing the state report.  And in the state report, always, there are so many ceremonial things for the region.  But at the same time, the organisation of people with disabilities have vital role to look from the sideline if the report is giving a real picture.  And this is the Abilis Foundation facilitated to bring the civil society report.  And that was submitted.
>> RACHEL:  Sorry, Birendra, you've got less than a minute there.  Just last comments.  Thanks.
>> MR. BIRENDRA POKHAREL:  Yes, so people with disability and the represented organisation has very, very vital role and for bringing change and enhancing their capabilities that Abilis Foundation is doing from the grassroots from the global south.  Thank you so much.
>> SHANE HALPIN:  Thank you, Birendra.  That's really, really interesting.  And it's fascinating that the contribution to parliament has had that.  Sorry, let me start my video.  Sorry.
Yeah, so the contribution to parliament, the representation in parliament and having that effect.  And it brings it to people's attention, people with disability coming to the fore.  This is so important.  And again, "Nothing About Us Without Us."  This is really, really important.
I'm not going to speak too long, because I'm conscious of the time.  But now I'm going to introduce our panel this morning who are going to discuss that input.  And also one or two questions around specifically around the awakening response for us as leaders, and how we can empower ourselves and learn about this whole area, because for many of us, it is a new area and not necessarily our core business.  So I'm going to introduce now our panel.  And we have three on our panel this morning.  We have David Bainbridge.  We have Sean Copeland.  And Marjo Heinonen from Abilis Foundation from Finland.  David has worked for over 20 years in the international relief and development sector serving in the variety of senior roles at secretariat and project level.  He joined CBM in 2016 as the international director of CBM international Federation.  Transitioning in 2020 as the Executive Director for CBM global disability inclusion.  Which is a new Federation working in over 20 countries across Africa, Asia, and Latin America.
There's a lot more, but probably that will suffice.
Sean Copeland is from Tearfund.  Acting CEO of Tearfund.  And joined the organisation -- sorry, that has an annual budget of over $970,000 last year.  Prior to join, Sean was a Sales and Marketing manager in SME for construction company for nine years.  In addition to consulting with small businesses, he is also a spiritual mentor and passionate about helping people becoming all they were created to be.
And, finally, Marjo Heinonen.  I'm really battling with our Finnish pronunciation.  And Abilis based in Finland.  Marjo is director of Abilis and before that she worked in the development and disability sector since the late 1980s.  She has many, many years of experience having worked in Africa and Asia in the least developed countries in humanitarian crisis.
Abilis has an annual budget of 2.6 million Euro.  Main funder being the ministry of foreign affairs in Finland.  So I think that's probably good to hear.  Thank you, Marjo.
David, if I can come to you with my first question.  Really, a response to Birendra in terms of his engagement.  But I suppose the key issue that we all want to hear in terms of leaders is how do we in our organisations, some of us who are not necessarily focused on disability, but we are in leadership.  How do we make our organisations more inclusive for people with disabilities?
>> DAVID BAINBRIDGE:  Great, thanks, Shane for the question.  And thank you, Birendra, for all you shared regarding your work and the important progress you are reaching around ensuring "Nothing About Us Without Us."
I think on this question of how to make our organisations more inclusive for persons with disabilities, as I reflected on this, I suggest 5 key consideration in my learning trying to pursue this within CBM global.  So the first is to ensure that this commitment towards inclusion is really champions and led by the leadership of the organisation.
I've seen in the past models where inclusion may be promoted by a specialist role or an individual, or a unit that is then trying to influence the wider organisation.  And that has limited impact of areas that this really needs to be sitting with champions and for priority as an organisation.  And building on that, ensuring the commitment toward inclusion is really grounded in the values, in the mission of the organisation.  It becomes part of the DNA, if you like.
And the very essence of the organisation is trying to achieve in its work.  Because as long as it sits as some kind of tick box, or compliance requirement, it will have very limited effectiveness.  So seeing this and recognizing in the Global is part of our value and part of our mission, and it becomes much more endorsed and embraced as central.
I think number 3 is to have very clear policies on inclusion, diversity, on accessibility, so that the policy position is absolutely transparent.  And then there are implementation plans to follow that.
And point number 4 builds on that to say we ensure a progressive realization approach with real honesty as to how much we're progressing with our improvement plans, where we're still falling short.  And we're very clear on that in CBM global where we have a lot of work to do.  And ensure that we understand progressive realization, gradual incremental improvement.  And accessibility is one such example at the moment where we're trying to take an incremental approach to improve our accessibility commitments.
And 5th and, finally, this is an overarching observation throughout all the steps, ensuring we ask people with disabilities.  We ask organisations of persons with disabilities.  We listen.  We understand their perspectives, their priorities to ensure that the direct focus really drives around everything we do in the commitment of towards making sure we are more inclusive.  Thank you, Shane.
>> SEAN COPELAND:  Wow.  That's great.  We can all go home now after that.  Very concise answer.  5 key points.  Champion by leaders is so important.  Guided by our mission and values.  And our policies.  Making sure that we have plans in place.  And asking persons with disabilities themselves.  This is so important.  Can I come to you, Sean, and ask you your experience with this over the last year?  Because you're not a disability organisation.  So it would be interesting to hear how you got similar to us.
>> SEAN COPELAND:  Yeah, thanks.  Good points, David.  Thank you.  I think for us, what we had to realize, we had to start somewhere.  And it would be very easy to get paralyzed by trying to over define the goal.  I mean, I understand when there's a change, you need to know where you're going.
But we can't steer the boat unless it in the water so we have to start somewhere and some action.  So for us, it was trying to picture what does disability and inclusion look like for our organisation?  But don't wait until we have everything mapped out and get clarified.
You know, we had to start talking about it with staff.  And we started to do an evaluation on some of the basics.  But we had to have learning sessions with other organisations.  And this process has been really valuable and beneficial to us.
And I say in conjunction with our experience within the VIVID project was last spring, we undertook a culture assessment within the organisation.  And that showed us or confirmed to us that we are a learning organisation.  That we have strength as a learning organisation.  So it helped us to begin really trying to integrate what we're learning through VIVID and how we can bring that back into the organisation.  So it was about our mindset change, then creating awareness through the language we used, and then that was lead thing to behavior change.
So now our process is to build systems to support those behaviors.  And I think that's where we are now.  So we started very much at the basics.  And we're learning now to see, well, how do we build those systems across the broader organisation?
>> SHANE HALPIN:  Okay.  Thanks, Sean.  You're quite similar to our engagement.  I remember Colette giving me a questionnaire at the beginning of our process.  And to be honest, I couldn't make head or tail of it in terms of all the -- you know, it was about our understanding how disability inclusive we were.  So how far back were we?  It's quite interesting reflecting back two years ago.  I'm not saying we have made huge progress, but I remember getting frustrated with the questionnaire.  And giving that feedback to Catherine, I think it was.  Because it was we weren't there at all.  We weren't in the picture at all in terms of our disability awareness.
We work with people with disabilities through our partners, but in terms of our own, or my own personal engagement, it was so removed.  But let's pass on to Marjo.  And Marjo, the same question to you around how do we make our organisations more inclusive do you think as leaders?
>> MARJO HEINONEN:  Thank you, Shane.  And also thank you colleagues.  I think David and Shane already mentioned so many points from my list.  I also had 5 main points that I wanted to highlight.  And I don't want to repeat.  But maybe to emphasize couple of concrete points also to help you with, you know, practical steps.
I like the idea of conducting a study or like a disability audit to get really concrete points to be accurate.  Be open and willing to change your own organisation.  And really, make this somehow relevant for your organisation.
It's also important to make a concrete implementation plan.  And you can take steps gradually.  So steps towards inclusion.  And you should be somehow proactive or demonstrate somehow your way.  And when you work with persons with disabilities and organisations of persons with disabilities, learning from them.  Share your experiences and ask questions.  And start acting.  I think that is very important.
It's not just black and white.  There are many ways to implement disability inclusion, depending on your organisation, and what you do and how you work.
So somehow be active and be even proactive.  And be ready to learn and exchange ideas with others.
You can also be like a role model or a model to other NGOs or other organisations how you implement disability inclusion in your work.  It's really important to ensure that accessibility will be included.  So reasonable accommodation was already mentioned.  But accessibility should also be understood in a wide way.  So there are different types of disabilities, different types of needs for persons with disabilities.  So they can really be addressed and accommodated.
So an organisation as well as the employer can really make many adjustments and work together with persons with disabilities.  And it can really work out well.  Thanks.
>> SHANE HALPIN:  Thank you, Marjo.  And I've been getting text messages there or chat box messages to say the others in the consortium had the same problem dealing with volunteering.  So okay, I don't feel too bad.  You mentioned some interesting points there, Marjo.  I like to ask you maybe a little bit off script.  But I'm interested to know about reasonable accommodation.  Because we had a meeting in Finland about reasonable accommodation.  And one of the scary thing around funders is this big area of how to make our projects, you know, how to include disability in our projects.  How to include people with disabilities in our projects.  And reasonable accommodation for me was sort of highlighted at that meeting.
You know, do you have anything to add or any words of wisdom on that for me?
>> MARJO HEINONEN:  Thank you, Shane.  There are many ways how to implement reasonable accommodation.  I think one of my advice would be budget some money for reasonable accommodation.  And also explain to the donor that there is a need to have some allocation that can be used.  For example, for material or sign language interpretation, or any other assistance or special needs during the project.  So depending on the case, depending on the disabilities involved, there are different types of needs.  And then also exercises that we can make.
So personal assistance could be one thing for physical disabled.  But also other means could be good to realize.
>> SHANE HALPIN:  Great.  I remember your Chair at the Board saying focus on the ability and not the disability.  That the mindset is when we come from a volunteering perspective is to focus, oh gosh, will I be able to do this?  What will work?  So the whole mindset needs to change little bit, I think, around this.  Focusing on the ability of the person and not on the disability, I think is a good place to start as well.
And I come back to you, then, David with this other question.  Which is really around how do we help to unlock the economic value of people with disabilities?  So probably something similar to something we covered there.
>> DAVID BAINBRIDGE:  Thanks, Shane.  I think my first observation would be around mindset, our attitude.  If I share a confession, I think back over my years working in the sector of humanitarian relief and development, and for many, many years I was on the taking needs assessment in humanitarian settings or supporting projects that were built on community participation.  But I'm well aware that a disability perspective was completely absent.  So I wasn't thinking or wasn't aware of the importance of capturing the voice, the perspective of people with disabilities that would have been typically excluded within those projects that I was involved with.
So I think it's important that as leaders, we recognize the importance of mind set, that this just needs to become part of the way we think.  It's not enough that it's sort of in a procedural document or in our policies, but it has to just come from our mindset, our attitudes, and awareness.  And we need some humility.  I'll speak about myself.  We have improvement to make and work to do.
I think then to recognize the importance of diversity to unlock social and economic value of people with disabilities in our organisations, we need to understand the barriers, the at latitudinal barrier, the exclusion that people with disabilities face, and that requires a conscious strategy from the organisation to ensure those barriers are overcome.  An example of reasonable accommodation that Marjo just shared.  And entry level opportunities into start positions.  A number of our country offices provide internships.  So we want to build on and learn from those approaches.
And I guess my final observation is intersectionality, basically recognizing that in pursuing diversity, we need to recognize barriers in all their forms.  So not just disability, but gender for example.  So women with disabilities may face particular challenges in having traditional barriers, attitudes that need to be overcome.  So if we're serious about this unlocking of potential for people with disabilities, we need to take that comprehensive approach.
>> SHANE HALPIN:  Great.  Thank you, David.
>> RACHEL:  Just a reminder there's 4 minutes left allocated for the interview there.  Thanks.
>> SHANE HALPIN:  Thanks, Rachel.  Sean.  In terms of what do you think about unlocking the economic potential?
>> SEAN COPELAND:  Yeah, I think I would even, if I may, just ask that question at a deeper level.  Are we're realizing the genuine value of the person rather than just the social and economic value?
And if we can ask ourselves are we recognizing just the value of the person?  Then that will feed into everything that we're doing and doing for them which with him feed into the wider economic value and social value.  So I think it's really important just to see them as a person, and then, you know, if they happen to be a person with a disability, what is their value as a human being?  And one of the things for us, we are working in a development relief sector.  We've realized we have a dichotomy and that two of our programs, we incorporate how we work with people with disabilities.  But, yet, as an organisation, we hadn't been implementing and bringing those back to the organisation.  So this process with the VIVID project has enabled us to see that.  As David said, we're the blanks, where the bias and blind spots have been, that's been a helpful process for us.
>> SHANE HALPIN:  Thanks, Sean.  And Marjo, I'm conscious of the time.  Sorry.
>> MARJO HEINONEN:  Yes, I would like to add look at the expertise, the scales, the qualifications and not the disability.  That's a key point.  So start recruiting experts with disabilities and accommodate, and really arrange reasonable accommodation and meet the individual needs from your side.  But ensure that the staff with disabilities enjoys equal treatment, equal possibilities and benefits.  That's my advice.  Thanks.
>> SHANE HALPIN:  Thanks, Marjo.  I'm just going to bring back Birendra.  Birendra, if you like to come back and give us what you feel about this so far?  I don't know if you're on mute?  Brenda.
>> Yes, Shane.  I hope you can hear me.
>> SHANE HALPIN:  Sorry, I'm looking for Birendra.  He's our guest speaker.  Sorry, Brenda.
>> MR. BIRENDRA POKHAREL:  Yes, the engagement for persons with disability is very much important for the different development as it is important for the private sector engagement.  As well as the top market.  With the disability and inclusive development, we talk about the disability inclusion development.  And how they can be product of citizens in the families and citizens of the community.  So the private sector should also take consideration of capabilities for people with disabilities as they are engaged in the different business arena, then the productivity has been very much high.  We have one example in the hospitality business, and other interoperative development.  So people with disability are the contributors to the society.  Investment is given for the development, and the capacity enhancement.  So that is my reflection.
>> SHANE HALPIN:  Thank you, Birendra.  Guys, I need now just to get maybe, if you wouldn't mind, giving me one overwriting outcome of the project that what would it be?  And I like to turn this into some sort of commitment that perhaps we can work on together.  Just maybe one or two lines on that if you could on reflection of the project.  David?
>> DAVID BAINBRIDGE:  Yes, thanks, Shane.  Very briefly, I think commitment is very much building on the wonderful and diverse relationships that have been established through the consortium.  And to extend that commitment to working in partnership, including linking anyone interested into for example, the disability reference group.  That CBM global is a co-Chair at the moment.  So wanting to really build on the partnership relationships that we have and seek to go further.  Thanks.
>> SHANE HALPIN:  Thanks, David.  And Sean.
>> SEAN COPELAND:  Yeah, I would agree.  I think this whole experience has helped us.  We're seeing people who are couple of steps ahead.  We're seeing people much further ahead.  And we've been learning.  And so for us, our commitment is to continue that learning and growth, and, hopefully, continue it through the partnerships and relationships that we've been able to build.
>> SEAN COPELAND:  And Marjo.  Thanks, Sean.
>> MARJO HEINONEN:  I would emphasize the community of practice.  So we have been sharing experiences, expertise, and that is really building capacity and strengthening corporations and leading to further partnerships and disability projects.  That has been really wonderful.  Thank you for that.
>> SHANE HALPIN:  Thanks, Marjo.  Community of practice.  Okay, now I'm not rushing us, but we have 10 minutes or so.  I want to open it up to the audience.  So it's not just us talking today.  We have one or two people that I like to hear from.  Teemu.  Teemu Sokka.  He's the manager of fair trade Finland development corporation program.  And they've been involved implementing some of the measures in their organisation.  So maybe you like to give us little bit of input on that, Teemu.
>> TEEMU SOKKA:  Hello, everybody.  Yes, thanks for this interesting seminar here.  I'm Teemu Sokka.  And so I run the corporation program here.  And most of you are aware of fair trade.  And so our mission is to work and produce employees to secure sustainable livelihood.  And fair trade standards are based in human rights and non-discrimination.  But it's also about trade and business, and private sector.
So this is voluntary existence.  The companies want to have fair trade system and consumers want to pay maybe extra for those products they want to buy.
So despite goodwill, not even the most ambitious sustainability standard like fair trade, so along with standards or making those standards more strict.  We cannot secure all equality for all people or sustainable lively hood.  So we have goodwill and we cannot solve all those problems.  And we cannot force private companies to hire persons with disabilities for quota of 16% for example.  But we still have that person in us.  And that is reason why we also deal with corporations here.  And for really full vision and what we want to achieve.  So we have different corporation side that I run, and partly incorporation and help Abilis Foundation, our partners are trained in disability and inclusion especially in Africa.  And it really has been eye-opener for many participants.  And I had the pleasure to participate in some of those sessions myself.  And I've seen how it really has opened their eyes and changed the attitude.
And they never thought about it.  And so they never thought about disability issues or inclusion issues, or barriers, et cetera.  And when some of them have been influenced by common beliefs.  So when we first started study on accessibility and inclusion in Ethiopia, my expectations were not high, not because of this but naturally, I assumed that our partners would feel this inclusion being, again, something that for ministry of fair trade or people from north really push now tend to do.  But it wasn't like that.  The response was really, really positive.  Something really changed there.  And it really opened ears and eyes there.  And I have heard many, many times after that, thanks for this, and we never thought about that.  And they're introducing like the new office, hey, look there now we have this and this here.
But that would have never happened if this study or disability inclusion would not been part of our program.  And the next new approach we started later, our partners in Africa, they had identified local disability partner themselves.  And so it wasn't anymore push from here.  So we managed to wake them up to start to think about these issues.
So what we have done is, like, as Marjo said, we've been active.  And we've been.
>> RACHEL:  Sorry, Teemu.  Just less than a minute there please.  Thanks.
>> TEEMU SOKKA:  Yeah, couple of words.  Nothing else.  So focusing on really "ability."  And barriers.  Like we work with flower companies, and they're hiring 20,000 people.  So there's some jobs that have disability people can do.  But this does not work for all.  There's goodwill of those private companies and fair trade standards and discrimination.  So the private sector we work with, they have been open for this corporation.  They just needed a bit of support initiated.  And we lit that flame and now it keeps on burning.
So our current program is ending now.  And I would say this disability inclusion has been one of our success stories.  And it's much better than I dreamed of.  So, yeah, that's a bit from link of private sector.  But somewhere in between to the private sector.  Yeah, thanks.
>> SHANE HALPIN:  Great.  Thanks, Teemu.  Very interesting how people are empowered or engaged.  It reminds us very much of our own experience within VC how I think we were initially asleep.  And I think having that input, which wouldn't have come without this particular project, I suppose, it made me and the organisation more aware of how much we need to do.  So thank you for that reflection.
There is an interesting question, I think, in the chat.  Perhaps we can hear from Father Pasco.  Father, are you there?  You have to unmute yourself.  I can't see you.
>> Yes.  I'm here.
>> SHANE HALPIN:  Can you tell us what your comment was?  I'd be interested to hear from you.
>> Well, the comment was appreciated that inclusion of economic contribution has existed among in the memorial.  Each culture had its own [Audio fading in and out] and contribution of the community.  So my question is how we collect the care or [Audio fading in and out] so that we can integrate more than inclusion -- (lost audit I don't).
>> SHANE HALPIN:  I think you're dropping in and out.  Father Pasco is in Fort Uganda.  So each community in time in the memorial had one or two ways of unlocking the economic value of persons with disability.  And how can these be collected and incorporated into our learning on a global level from different cultures?  Would anybody like to take that one?
>> DAVID BAINBRIDGE:  This is David here.  I can offer a response.  I think I would have to challenge the notion that there is a kind of established commitment toward inclusion across the globe that they can be, but I think one example, I met an individual in Uganda and it's a performative experience in my journey.  A person who had polio as a child and described to me how exclusion was his whole life experience.  And only through very significant personal journey he was able to become an established leader within his community leading a community development process.  But needing to overcome huge barriers.
So I think my challenge would be how do we ensure we gather learning on how to most effectively overcome barriers that exist, to overcome exclusion that exist in all of our society.  In my society in the UK and around the world.  Because we see many examples where inclusion is being achieved.  So let's celebrate those situations.  But let's draw our learning from what makes for most effective ways to overcome that kind of systemic discrimination that people with disabilities tell us is their lived reality.
>> SHANE HALPIN:  Thanks, David.  Does anybody -- Marjo or Sean want to comment on that?
>> MARJO HEINONEN:  Yes, if I could just add couple of more points.  I would like to emphasize that there is very often lack of understanding what is disability all about.  So raising awareness on disability makes usually a big difference.  And as Teemu explained, it can be very eye-opening to understand the disability a bit better.
And also mentioned here earlier, there are miss beliefs, there are traditional taboo and also very strong stigma on person with disabilities.  And so, basically, making efforts on raising awareness.  And then also whenever persons with disabilities can really participate, like show the talents and also like demonstrate that we are human being.  And we are also citizens.  And we can contribute to family lives, our communicators, society, and so forth.
So gradually also attitudes and behaviors can be changed.  And nowadays, disability inclusion is very well recognized by donor agencies, international organisations, and so forth.  So that's why also my message to Uganda is that just raise it up, discuss as much as possible, and really encourage people with disabilities to raise these issues up.
>> SHANE HALPIN:  Great.
>> MARJO HEINONEN:  Gradually we can change the world.
>> SHANE HALPIN:  One day at a time.  I'm conscious of time.  Maybe just one more.  I wonder if Marco is there?  I'm conscious that Marco might be in the audience and maybe like a quick comment?  Marco is part of Aspen, which is our consortium partners.
>> Yes, thank you, Shane.  And I want to only to share our experience as ASPEM, because for us, the perspective that we introduced in our organisation with this project, it's very important.  And a new point of view.  We're very engaged in sending volunteers, so including the inclusion perspective, it's very important.  And we engage our organisation from the border to the staff, because we are assured to implement a new perspective and new way to implement the sending of volunteers is very important to involve all of the organisation level.  And also, it's important to have next step of the project that's reviewing the policies in the managing of volunteers.  So from the selection to security, and communication, and so on.
So I want to share our thanks to all partners for these results.
>> SHANE HALPIN:  Thanks, Marco, very much.  And guys, I'm conscious of the time is now almost up.  But I do need to hear from Sarah.  Sarah o tool.  And she is CBM from Ireland.  And I ask Sarah to join us to give us maybe a quick run through of the key action points that maybe we as leaders and leaders present here in the audience today.  Sorry, we couldn't get everybody in.  I think the experience might be that we need to lengthen these type of meetings in order to get more engagement from the participants.
So Sarah, can I pass it over to you if you're there?
>> Yes, thanks, Shane.  And just first of all to say thanks to VC for organizing today's event.  I was at the earlier session and really insightful stuff coming through and we can spend all day, many days talking about the experiences we've had, particularly, with this VIVID-T project.  And it's been a great experience for CBM Ireland.  And I was writing furiously there as panel was speaking about their experiences.  And what really stood out for me was a sense of community of practice, commitment to continue this road of learning and sharing our experiences.
Couple of key points.  One thing I did this morning was, I Googled this team of International Day of People with Disabilities.  And interestingly, it's around leadership and participation of persons with disabilities towards an inclusive accessible and sustainable post-COVID world.  And I think we've all learned on the last two years.  But what we take from this learning I think is really what's going to help us, as Marjo said, change the world one step at a time.  And key points, David mentioned about influencing leaders to drive inclusion is really when you see real change happening, making sure it's part of the culture of the organisation, part of its DNA.
And also what is really valuable is speaking frankly about our own experiences.  CBM Ireland disability organisation is focused on inclusion.  But we've learned a huge amount ourselves around what we do internally as an organisation.  So we're open and sharing about that too.
Funders, which is always a challenge.  I think we need to try and speak and be more robust with funders about the importance of inclusion and everything we do and they do.
And for us, it's only the beginning.  We've also seen there's a huge amount of resources that have been developed throughout the lifetime of this project.  And it's important for us to widen the net and share those with the sector.  Share them with our own different force that we're involved in.  And really just to say to people be part of this movement and play your part.  Even for those attending today haven't been part of VIVID to take one key thing you learned today and bring that back to your organisation and start to take action now.  Thank you, Shane.
>> SHANE HALPIN:  Great.  Thanks, Sarah.  And thank you, all, for the guest speakers today, particularly, Birendra for sharing and the wisdom that's all in the leaders.  I hope it's been of some use to you.  It has been an amazing journey for us.  And I'm not just saying that because it's EU sponsored or EU supported.  It organisation has incorporated this into the strategic plan.  Disability was not on our radar and it wasn't on my radar before joining this program.  But 15% of the world population has a disability, either acquired or from birth.  That's a huge, huge number.  And it cannot -- we cannot just fail to ignore that.
So I thank you, all, for listening.  And I hope you'll join us later for the next session.  We will be sharing resources.  And we will be hearing more about the core humanitarian standards and our journey into that area as well.  So thank you!
>> RACHEL:  Thanks, everybody.  Breaking now for lunch.  So thanks, everyone!