National Summit on Sustainable Development Goals and Disability in Nepal

National Federation of the Disabled Nepal (NFDN) is the national cross disability umbrella body of the organizations of persons with disabilities. It has been working in disability rights promotion for last 25 years. Currently, NFDN is representing 335 member organizations throughout the country. As the pioneer of disability rights movement of Nepal the contribution of NFDN on influencing and facilitating government, policy makers and civil society for establishing the concept of disability with right based perspective, getting the UNCRPD ratified, establishing rights of persons with disabilities in the national constitution and getting the new disability rights act passed from the parliament is highly appreciated by disabled community, government and civil society as well.

Despite the commitment of the government and all development actors to implement the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) with the full inclusion of all marginalized communities, NFDN has observed a remarkable lacking and gaps in the inclusion of disability issues in the ongoing development programs and SDG related initiatives of government and other different development actors.

Currently NFDN is pouring its effort to promote Disability Inclusive Development by enhancing the inclusion of disability issues in the programs, strategies and process of government, development actors and civil society organizations that are made for achieving the SDGs. Taking all these issues into account, NFDN is going to organize “The National Summit on Sustainable Development Goals and Disability” on December 18^th and 19^th at Kathmandu. This program is going to be organized on the occasion of International Day of Persons with Disabilities

The key objective of the summit is to create a synergy and set a foundation for disability inclusive SDGs efforts in Nepal .The two days summit will run with different joint and parallel sessions where the issues of persons with disabilities linked to different SDGs will be discussed. Bringing the relevant government stakeholders, national planning commission, national human rights commission, various development partners, UN agencies, INGOs, civil society organizations, private sectors, disabled peoples’ organizations (DPOs) and other disability right organizations in the same platform this summit will conclude;

• A comprehensive position paper on the status of the inclusion of disability issues in ongoing development programs of government, civil society and various development actors and different SDG related initiatives.
• A renewed commitment and a strong workable way forward for developing synergy among government and inter/national development partners to contribute for disability inclusive development as per CRPD and SDGs.
• A broad strategic guideline for the disability stakeholders and DPOs to prepare their action plan for the implementation of SDGs in the context of federal structure of the country.

After the summit NFDN has planned to carry out a regular but intensive follow up and provide technical support (if needed) to each relevant stakeholder to encourage them for the implementation of the recommendations of the summit and play the strategy developed in the summit by mobilizing DPOs in local level. The documentation of achievements, outcomes, learning and experiences will also be carried out simultaneously for at least one year and by the end of 2018 a status report will be produced and disseminated.

So, NFDN request to all government agencies, policy makers, UN Agencies/ Systems in Nepal, NFDN’s partners, I/NGOs, development actors, international community, media, civil society organizations, DPOs, disability rights organizations and corporate sectors to join hands (financially, technically, morally) and express solidarity to make this campaign successful in terms of the inclusion of disability issues in each development initiatives from federal to local level.

We are seeking your solidarity for Make the Right Real.