In 2018, HI, CBM, CDD and HelpAge International established the ADWG to promote the inclusion of persons with disabilities in established humanitarian coordination structures. In the first two years of its existence, the ADWG "has been paddling along"60 and did not have any tangible influence on the larger humanitarian response. Some individual initiatives of its members had an impact: for example, with support from CBM and CDD,61 the WASH sector developed common standards on the construction of accessible latrines. However, the ADWG had an overall lack of strategic vision and of a common approach to advocating on behalf of older persons and persons with disabilities.
This changed in 2019, when the ADWG began to take a structured approach. It changed its name from the ‘Age and Disability Task Force’ to the ‘Age and Disability Working Group’, developed terms of reference, which specify objectives, activities, membership and reporting procedures (although these are still under revision), and hired a coordinator to ensure smooth coordination between its members and with external organizations. In early 2020, the group also established a formal collaboration framework with the Protection Working Group, under the leadership of UNHCR, and agreed on a joint action plan for its members, which outlines the main tasks to advocate on the inclusion of older persons and persons with disabilities.
In 2020, these efforts delivered their first results in the humanitarian response in Cox’s Bazar. Together with the Protection Working Group, the ADWG published a joint COVID-19 Guidance Note on making the response age- and disability-inclusive. The Guidance Note highlights factors that put older persons and persons with disabilities more at risk of contracting the virus and provides humanitarian actors with recommendations on mitigating these risks (ADWG and Protection Working Group, 2020). Moreover, together with the Protection Working Group and the REACH Initiative, the ADWG started working on a joint needs assessment.
"It relies on quantitative and qualitative data collection methods and has the following objectives: 1) to further the response-wide understanding of the safety and dignity of persons with disabilities across all age groups; 2) ensure meaningful access to multi-sectoral services and assistance; 3) foster participation and empowerment within community and humanitarian spaces; 4) consider the specific requirements of persons with disabilities in disaster preparedness and risk reduction; and 5) capture the voices and experiences of persons with disabilities and older persons in a holistic and dignified fashion. The ADWG provides training to enumerators and technical support to the project team to ensure that the methodology, tools, data-collection process, analysis and use of data is inclusive to all persons with disabilities, including hard-to-reach groups, such as deaf persons and persons with autism. Results of the needs assessment are expected for the second half of 2020" (Funke, 2020, p. 32).62 In 2020, the ADWG is also working on a study of the World Food Programme food voucher system and how it can become more inclusive for persons with disabilities.63
Without doubt, these are steps to mainstream disability throughout the response and more efforts are necessary to ensure that all clusters ensure the inclusion of persons with disabilities in their interventions. The ADWG can make a vital contribution towards achieving this. At this point, the influence of the ADWG on the humanitarian coordination structures still heavily depends on the Protection Working Group and its lead agency UNHCR. Consequently, this relationship, though important, runs the risk of making the ADWG strongly dependent on UNHCR and the Protection Working Group Task Team (which consists of six influential agencies and NGOs).64
In fact, UNHCR largely determined the terms and conditions of their cooperation with ADWG, and initially even considered revising its terms of references to fit the expectations and needs of the Protection Working Group. Eventually, UNHCR decided to ease "this long and heavy process" and developed a list of nine objectives to be included in the terms of references of the ADWG’s coordinator, who is supposed to act as a bridge between UNHCR and the working group.65 The coordination framework between the ADWG and the Protection Working Group contains many of these ideas, demonstrating UNHCR’s strong role in laying the groundwork for their cooperation.
Yet, until 2020, UNHCR did not have a strong focus on disability inclusion. The 2019 Joint Government-UNHCR registration exercise, for example, relied on a binary ‘yes/no’ question to estimate the proportion of persons with disabilities in the camps instead of the WG-SS. It is therefore hardly surprising that the survey found that merely one per cent of the refugees has a disability, a figure that clearly contradicts the 2011 study, which finds that approximately 15 per cent of any population are persons with disabilities (WHO and World Bank, 2011).
In the long term, the ADWG strives to operate more independently and also to systematically involve more OPDs and other self-help groups from the Cox’s Bazar district. For the time being, close cooperation with the Protection Working Group is critical for the ADWG and its ability to exert influence on the humanitarian response. This is even more the case in light of the heavy workload of the ADWG chairs and co-chairs. Simultaneously, UNHCR and other agencies greatly benefit from the ADWG’s expertise.
Ultimately, the success of the ADWG depends on its visibility in the different sectors and their respective subgroups and on a clear and realistic strategy to incorporate persons with disabilities into the sectors’ policies. At this point, it is still too early to evaluate the impact of the ADWG on the humanitarian response.
However, it is clear that through close cooperation with the Protection Working Group, as well as other key agencies, the ADWG can position itself as a fervent supporter of age and disability inclusion, increase its visibility in the sector meetings, and meet the growing demands of technical support on disability-inclusive humanitarian action beyond the individual contributions of its members in various donor-recipient partnerships and consortia projects. In summary, the ADWG can offer valuable guidance, information and good practice examples that will be relevant for all humanitarian agencies involved in the response. Therefore, it can supplement individual partnership projects and bundle the expertise of key disability-focused NGOs that are active in different camp areas and host communities.