Promoting the rights of Children with disabilities innocenti digest no

partners work with over 100 local community 
development organizations active in mainstream 
development activities, including fishing, micro-
credit, health, housing, legal aid and women’s justice. 
A disability perspective is encouraged in all these 
activities by raising the awareness of staff, promoting 
awareness-raising campaigns,
 
inserting a disability 
dimension into induction programmes for new staff 
and by training project workers, such as the traditional 
birth attendants who participate in the health projects. 
This point is also illustrated by the experience of 
the Women’s Credit and Savings Programme in 
Viet Nam, established by Save the Children and 
run through the local Women’s Union. Monitoring 
of these micro-credit schemes demonstrated that 
although some persons with disabilities were using 
the scheme, many families with disabled members 
living in extreme poverty were afraid to borrow for 
fear they would be unable to repay the loans. An 
awareness-raising workshop held in partnership with 
the Women’s Union led to improved access to the 
scheme for women with disabilities and mothers 
of children with disabilities. These improvements 
included an increase in children with disabilities 
receiving scholarships and attending school and 
the provision of free essential treatment, including 
treatment of children suffering from cleft palate and 
eye conditions. Provision was also made for families 
with disabled members to receive assistance with 
their harvest. The overall result was that the largest 
NGO credit scheme in Viet Nam gained a clear 
disability perspective.
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Where programs work through community develop-
ment organizations, they avoid having to incur extra 
costs and benefit from existing skills, connections 
Box 6.3 World Health Organization programme on 
disability and rehabilitation
The mission of the Disability and Rehabilitation 
(DAR)
i
initiative of the World Health Organization 
(WHO) is “to enhance the quality of life for persons 
with disabilities through national, regional and 
global efforts.” The DAR team works with partners 
who implement programmes, including organiza-
tions representing persons with disabilities, and 
national and international professional and non-
professional non-governmental organizations. 
Current activities include:
• raising awareness about the magnitude and 
consequences of disability 
• facilitating data collection and analysing or dis
-
seminating disability-related data and information
• supporting, promoting and strengthening health 
and rehabilitation services for persons with dis-
abilities and their families 
• promoting the development, production, distri
-
bution and servicing of assistive technology 
• supporting the development, implementation, 
measuring and monitoring of policies to im-
prove the rights and opportunities for persons 
with disabilities 
• building capacity among health and rehabilitation 
policymakers and service providers, and 
• fostering multisectoral networks and