I had a very busy stay in New York City for the Zero Project the other week. Most of the time, I was in the headquarters of the United Nations over on 1st Avenue at the 18th Session of the Conference of States Parties (CoSP) to the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD). I realize that the first ever CoSP I attended was the 3rd Session back in 2010! Before, and during, CoSP, there were, however, a number of events to which I went and to which we at the Zero Project contributed. On Monday, June 9, I was invited both to attend and contribute to a roundtable on frugal innovation and innovation diplomacy organized by our friend Gidi Grinstein (founder of TOM Global) under the aegis of a collaboration between Reut USA and TOM USA and the American Jewish Committee. We had a very interesting afternoon of constructive discussion.
The following day, the Tuesday, my long-time friend Virginia Atkinson of the International Foundation for Electoral Systems (IFES) very kindly invited me and a number of others to join IFES and Microsoft (at its NYC headquarters) to discuss development of a global dataset that examines the accessibility features of existing elections technology and assistive technology that can be used in elections.
Whilst there may only have been a few of us there in person, we were joined by a large number of others online to brainstorm both how best to structure such a dataset and what open data might be needed. I hope we may have been able to provide IFES and Microsoft with some useful thoughts.
And that evening, at the kind invitation of Cara Yar Kahn, I was able to attend a most enjoyable reception and panel at the Japan Society to learn about The Future of Financial Inclusion and the concept that, to create lasting opportunities and inclusive prosperity, you need to transform global financing and the finance sector “from inside out.” I believe the debate was carried.
And then, on the Wednesday, came our big event. The Zero Project co-sponsored a Side Event (From awareness to action: ensuring climate and crisis response that works for all) with the generous support of our longstanding partners at the Permanent Mission of Austria to the UN—and our co-sponsors: the Permanent Missions of the Commonwealth of Dominica and Uzbekistan, and Harvard Law School Project on Disability (HPOD). We had great contributions from all our sponsors and three truly excellent presentations. The presentations were kicked off by Professor Michael Stein, Co-founder and Executive Director of HPOD. He was followed by Emina Cerimovic, Associate Disability Rights Director at Human Rights Watch. And we were so pleased also to be joined by a third presenter, Ruchi Singh, Disability Inclusion Specialist, in the Global Department for Social Development at The World Bank, who was able to squeeze us into her tight schedule.
Amongst other issues, we explored innovative approaches to embedding accessibility, disability-inclusive policies, and community-driven solutions into climate and crisis response efforts. In addition, we had the chance to review strategies to raise public awareness and drive meaningful change—primarily through collaboration centered around the sharing of good practices—in the hopes of ensuring that persons with disabilities are justifiably recognized as the key contributors to resilience, sustainability, and social development in the face of climate and crisis response challenges.
My personal thanks go to Oliver Grünbacher, First Secretary at the Austrian Permanent Mission, without whom the event would not have been possible, to Stefan Pretterhofer, his colleague and Deputy Permanent Representative at the mission, not only for sponsoring the event, but also for his great words closing it, not least his encouragement to attendees to heed our Call for Nominations. And, last but not least, to all participants for making it an interesting, informative, and very relevant discussion.
It is always good to catch up with old friends when at CoSP. Amongst others, it was great to see my old friend, and fellow Zero Project Ambassador, Luis Gallegos and his wonderful wife Fabiola and Angela Kohama of the World Food Programme, whom I had not seen for an age.
Finally, both of whom I had seen much more recently, there was Donna Martin of ANCOR—I was honoured to have been able to contribute at the ANCOR conference down in San Diego earlier this year—and Genevieve Fitzgibbon of Keystone Human Services. (Genevieve is also is co-chair of the ANCOR Global Council and a director on the ANCOR Foundation Board.)