2021: The year in review - Light for the World International %

General

As 2021 comes to an end, we reflect how Light for the World – with your support and partnership – has changed lives.

We are proud of our colleagues, partners & supporters! Their impact and resilience, in the face of ongoing challenge, is inspirational. Read on for a good news, end-of-year detox!

Champions of inclusion

To kick off let’s start with our impactful Disability Inclusion Facilitator (DIF) model. What started out as a pilot programme in just one country – went global in 2021! These incredible youth role models are now active in Bangladesh, Burkina Faso, Ethiopia, Kenya, Mozambique, Uganda, South Sudan & beyond.

A group of participants in a course of the Disability Inclusion Academy in Uganda

After piloting the DIF model in Uganda, Light for the World established the “Disability Inclusion Academy”, a formal fellowship programme on disability inclusion.

Dorcus is a Ugandan woman with a physical disability who is trained as a disability inclusion facilitator. She uses a motorcycle taxi for her commute. The driver is holding on to her crutches.

Dorcus, 33, is a Disability Inclusion Facilitator with Light for the World’s programme “Make 12.4% Work”. Here she is on her way to meet a business client, using a boda boda.

Isabella, a young Ugandan woman with disability trained as disability inclusion facilitator, coordinating the food distribution in Karamoja in Northern Uganda.

Isabella is a Disability Inclusion Facilitator. At the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, she coordinated food distribution for vulnerable communities in Northern Uganda.

Fighting the pandemic

4 Kenyan women show the protective masks they produced. the masks have a transparent part over the mouth to help deaf and hard of hearing people with communication. — Face mask production and distribution in Kenya. The face masks have a transparent section for easier communication via sign language (sign language uses a lot of facial expressions that convey crucial meaning) and lip reading.

Meanwhile, COVID-19 continued to cause havoc around the world. Figures on our emergency response, covering March 2020-February 2021, show we reached more than 114,000 people with food, health, hygiene, and economic and educational support.

1, 2, 3 – I can see!

Young Burkinabe girl with her mother in Gaoua Burkina Faso. The girl wears a white eye bandage after her cataract surgery. Both are smiling. — Ami with her mother after her cataract surgery, Gaoua, Burkina Faso.

Excitingly, our comprehensive child eye health programme “1,2,3 I can see!” began this year in Burkina Faso, Ethiopia, Mozambique and Uganda. It will make child eye health services more available and affordable, through strategies devised hand-in-hand with the Ministries of Health & Education.

Communication changes lives!

What’s more, with funding from the Austrian Development Agency, we trained Mozambican police in 2021 in sign language. Now they can communicate better with people who are deaf or hard of hearing.

Our partner activists also raised their voices on International Day of People with Disabilities.

Jane Waithera, Kenyan woman with albinism, speaks on video for International Day of Persons with Disabilities. A white male IS interpreter is to her right.

Women with disabilities on top

To add to this, many of the year’s successes came from women with disabilities.

Gamze Elibol, Bernice Oyeleke and Dr. Robbie Francis Watene received the Her Abilities Award, judged by an illustrious jury.
Nighty, Beatrice and Jenny kicked off their businesses in Uganda, using start-up capital provided by Light for the World.
And we heard, and amplified the voices of, thousands of women with disabilities in Kenya.

Collage of Her Abilities Laureates 2018-2021.

Her Abilities celebrates the incredible achievements of women leaders with disabilities around the world. This image shows a collage of Laureates from 2018-2021.

A woman in a blue dress holds two pieces of colourful fabric out wide in her arms

Akwero Nighty received funding from Light for the World. She has since revitalised her tailoring business.

A woman in Uganda smiles as she takes payment from another woman for liquid soap. They are in a courtyard together.

Similarly, Zola Beatrice started off selling liquid soap but is now running her own hairdressing business.

A woman in a blue patterned dress stands with a sign:

Jenny revitalised her tailoring business, and she has used the profits to start a cleaning business. She is also training to become a Disability Inclusion Facilitator!

Woman wearing blue scarf and head scarf, and holding crutches, smiles into the camera. In the background is a rural road and trees.

Portrait of Lucy Nkatha, peer advisor in Kenya for the Amplifying Voices of Women with Disabilities project, funded by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs Netherlands. Photographer: Njiiri Karago.

Stronger together

But of course none of our successes would have been possible without our awesome partners. So we are very proud of the:

CapAble platform for higher education, launched together with the Scholars Program of Mastercard Foundation!
role our local partners played in the finalisation of South Sudan’s first national sign language dictionary
brilliant IAPB campaign around World Sight Day which we contributed to with more than 70,000 eye screenings
Uganda Business and Disability Network growing stronger and stronger, now including some of the country’s largest companies!
work with Inclusive Futures, funded by UK Aid
GPE campaign which motivated us to raise our hands in support of quality inclusive education for all

members of South Sudan's first blind football team dressed in their jerseys stand together raising their right hand to show their support for an education campaign. — South Sudan’s first blind football team joined the Global Campaign for Education’s #RaiseYourHand campaign on behalf of Light for the World.

People power

And let’s not forget the individual people we work who wowed us this year with their unique stories of impact…

Ethiopian grandfather Mekonen with a white eye bandage after his cataract surgery happily carries his grandchild

This photo of Mekonen Bezabeh, seeing his grandchild again after successful cataract surgery, was among the winners of IAPB’s 2021 photo competition. Photographer: Ulrich Eigner.

young Burkinabe boy Zakaria with his mother after his eye surgery. both are smiling and Zakaria still wears his white eye bandage.

The story of the bond between Zakaria and his grandmother touched our hearts. Zakaria, who is Burkinabe, had an eye operation this year which restored his sight.

We also kicked off a massive project in Burkina Faso with national partner SNEC, that will eventually make 40% of all schools in Burkina Faso inclusive!

Mekdes Worku is teaching sign language classes during COVID school shutdown

Finally, Hamele & Yekatit schools in Ethiopia, which are supported by Light for the World, were delighted that all Deaf students passed their exams towards secondary education this year.

Colleague pride

…or our colleagues who wowed us with their expertise and passion!:

Our Inclusive Education Director made the prestigious D-30 list
Three of our eye health experts were recognised as “Eye health heroes”
Our Kenyan colleagues received official recognition for their “exemplary service“
We welcomed Professor Tom Shakespeare as our new International Chair, as well as five new Board members;
This LinkedIn post from our colleague Jane Waithera explaining the power of glasses – was one of our top performing social media posts of the year!

Our Inclusive Education Director Nafisa Baboo made it onto the prestigious D-30 list on MyDiversability.com.

Alem, a young Ethiopian woman in a light pink top looks straight into the camera.

Alem Mekonnen was named a 2021 Eye Health Hero by IAPB

Flavia is a young Italian woman with short dark brown hair wearing an orange blazer and gray top

Flavia Arato was named a 2021 Eye Health Hero by IAPB

Adugna smiling. The young Ethiopian woman is wearing big silver loop earrings and a blue top

Adugna Amin was named a 2021 Eye Health Hero by IAPB

Light for the World Kenya team members, in running gear and with a sign saying

Our wonderful Kenyan team received official recognition for their outstanding inclusion work. Here, they enjoy the Beyond Zero run by Kenya’s First Lady.

A man in a wheelchair looks to his right. He is surrounded by school children. They are in Mozambique.

Photo of Tom Shakespeare visiting Light for the World programme participants in 2017. (c) Carlos Litulo.

Policy change

Because we want our impact to last, policy milestones in 2021 which we are delighted to have played our part in include:

South Sudan signing an Inclusive Education policy
The UN adopting the “Vision for Everyone” Resolution
Uganda including school eye health within the Government training curriculum of teachers
Global advocacy at the Conference of State Parties to the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (COSP) on the lack of representation given to Deaf members

f-year old south sudanese girl nyamush has hydrocephalus. she is led by the hand of her teacher and is surrounded by her classmates, all wearing yellow and black school uniforms. — Four-year-old Nyamush lives in one of the IDP camps in Juba, South Sudan. In the year and a half that Light for the World has supported her, she has started going to school, which she loves, and is learning alongside other children.

So what next, for 2022?

Now: check out our Strategy 2023 animation which will guide our work, this year and next.

We will also ensure more inclusive eye health: that women and people with disabilities can equally access services.
You will see our increased technical support on inclusive education including visits, pedagogical resources and ‘how to’ guides.
And we will roll out our economic empowerment programme in Mozambique, Burkina Faso, Malawi and India. This will include 60 Disability Inclusion Facilitators, 2 new innovation labs, and 1 new cross-regional learning route for awareness raising!

Summing up – that’s an impressive list of achievements. Thank you for everything you do in partnership with Light of the World to support our continuing impact!