6 September 2023

Inclusion of persons with disability: Latin American cities share good practices during the last MCR2030 Lab

Source(s): United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction – Regional Office for the Americas and the Caribbean

The cities of La Paloma (Uruguay), Pudahuel (Chile), and Santa Ana (Costa Rica) shared their experiences in strengthening inclusive and participatory risk management for the resilience of persons with disabilities during the sixth edition of the MCR2030 Labs, held on 23 August 2023.

All these cities led the regional pilot of the Scorecard's Addendum for the Inclusion of Persons with Disability of the Making Cities Resilient 2030 (MCR2030) initiative. The tool aims to support the assessment of the capacities of local governments to design, formulate and implement policies for the inclusion of persons with disabilities in disaster risk reduction. It incorporates persons with disabilities as an integral part of the development of local resilience strategies.

According to the World Report on Disability (WHO, 2011), 15% of the world's population live with some form of disability. The United Nations Disability Inclusion Strategy (UNDIS, 2018) calls for strengthening system-wide accessibility for persons with disabilities and the mainstreaming of their rights and seeks to support Member States in achieving the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, leaving no one behind and reaching those furthest behind across all pillars of the United Nations. The Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015-2030 also calls for a whole-of-society approach in disaster risk reduction processes and to put in place multi-sectoral, inclusive and accessible resilience practices.

We thank our distinguished panel of speakers:

- Jennifer Guralnick, Programme Officer, UNDRR Americas and the Caribbean

- Rosa María Juárez, President of the GIRDD-LAC Network

- María Elena Opazo Cortes, Director of Disaster Risk Management, Pudahuel, Chile

- Emilia Jiménez, Risk Reduction Officer of Santa Ana

- Sergio Muniz, Mayor of La Paloma

- Carlos Kaiser, Founder of the NGO Inclusiva

Watch the full recording of the webinar (Spanish):

The MCR2030 Labs aim to promote the exchange of knowledge and experience on disaster resilience among cities in the Americas and the Caribbean. The principle of our Labs is to address priority issues for the implementation of the Sendai Framework at the local level through innovative and cross-sectoral perspectives. They therefore open a unique space to strengthen the capacity of local governments to operationalise a holistic vision of resilience for the implementation of risk reduction policies.

This sixth edition was co-organised by UNDRR, Regional Office for the Americas and the Caribbean, and RIADIS - Latin American Network of Organisations of Persons with Disabilities and their Families. It was moderated by Adriana Campelo, MCR2030 Regional Coordinator in the Americas and the Caribbean, and Clément Da Cruz, MCR2030 Junior Programme Officer in the Americas and the Caribbean.