NN Business Desk :
Inaccessibility to workplace, lack of inclusive recruitment policy and a negative attitude towards individuals with physical impairments are key barriers to ensuring inclusive and decent work for sustainable economic growth, the discussants have said.
They came up with the remarks at a workshop on “Making Workplace Disability Inclusive: Developing Employers’ Network” held in the capital on Sunday.
Bangladesh Employers Federation (BEF) and the Bangladesh Skills for Employment and Productivity (B-SEP), a project of the ILO, jointly organised the programme.
The aim of the event is to hear from the employers how to advise organisations wishing to start making their workforce more disability inclusive.
Bangladesh Business and Disability Network (BBDN) is a voluntary group of representatives from business, non-governmental and physically challenged peoples’ organisations with its primary purpose to help those with impairments to find decent work and employers to recruit staff members with disabilities.
“In Bangladesh, the cost of disability, due to forgone income from lack of schooling and employment, both for people with disabilities, and their caregivers, is estimated at $1.2 billion annually, or 1.7% of GDP,” said Albert Mollah, an ILO consultant, in his keynote speech on Competitive Advantage of Hiring Person with Disability.
Currently, there are about 16 million persons with disability in the country while around 10% of the total world’s population or roughly 650 million people live with disability.
Talking on the barriers to employment of persons with disability, Mollah said 15% are facing impairment while 85% barriers. Attitudinal, environmental and institutional barriers make disability more severe, he added.
“Soft barriers such as negative societal attitudes and hard barriers such as inaccessible infrastructure lead to marginalisation and exclusion of people with disabilities,” said Murteza Rafi Khan in his presentation on “Towards a disability inclusive workforce”.
“We cannot ensure inclusive and sustainable economic growth of Bangladesh without building upon the abilities of 10% population with physical impairments, of which 40% are youth,” sad BEF president Salahuddin Kasem Khan.
Inaccessibility to workplace, lack of inclusive recruitment policy and a negative attitude towards individuals with physical impairments are key barriers to ensuring inclusive and decent work for sustainable economic growth, the discussants have said.
They came up with the remarks at a workshop on “Making Workplace Disability Inclusive: Developing Employers’ Network” held in the capital on Sunday.
Bangladesh Employers Federation (BEF) and the Bangladesh Skills for Employment and Productivity (B-SEP), a project of the ILO, jointly organised the programme.
The aim of the event is to hear from the employers how to advise organisations wishing to start making their workforce more disability inclusive.
Bangladesh Business and Disability Network (BBDN) is a voluntary group of representatives from business, non-governmental and physically challenged peoples’ organisations with its primary purpose to help those with impairments to find decent work and employers to recruit staff members with disabilities.
“In Bangladesh, the cost of disability, due to forgone income from lack of schooling and employment, both for people with disabilities, and their caregivers, is estimated at $1.2 billion annually, or 1.7% of GDP,” said Albert Mollah, an ILO consultant, in his keynote speech on Competitive Advantage of Hiring Person with Disability.
Currently, there are about 16 million persons with disability in the country while around 10% of the total world’s population or roughly 650 million people live with disability.
Talking on the barriers to employment of persons with disability, Mollah said 15% are facing impairment while 85% barriers. Attitudinal, environmental and institutional barriers make disability more severe, he added.
“Soft barriers such as negative societal attitudes and hard barriers such as inaccessible infrastructure lead to marginalisation and exclusion of people with disabilities,” said Murteza Rafi Khan in his presentation on “Towards a disability inclusive workforce”.
“We cannot ensure inclusive and sustainable economic growth of Bangladesh without building upon the abilities of 10% population with physical impairments, of which 40% are youth,” sad BEF president Salahuddin Kasem Khan.
